Three days before Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, most of my family evacuated to Houston. I had just started tenth grade, and was preparing myself for an honors track course load. I liked all of my classes except Biology II because it seemed like the teacher was going to be very strict, which made me nervous.
When I heard that another hurricane could be coming to New Orleans, I was somewhat relieved that I might get to miss that Biology class, at least for a few days.
The morning of August 26, I kept watching the news to see if my school was going to be closed. Usually when a hurricane is coming, the local news stations tell us which schools are closing due to inclement weather, and the closed schools scroll across the bottom of the screen. I was so excited to see that Xavier Prep, my high school, was one of them.
Despite the fact that the storm wasn't all that strong yet, we packed up and headed for Houston anyways.
My cousins and I just thought we'd be taking another evacuation "vacation" like we always did. During previous hurricanes, we evacuated to Bryan, TX, Atlanta and Birmingham, Ala. We'd go swimming, sightseeing or just hang out in each other's hotel rooms.
For Katrina, I evacuated with my immediate family, which included my mama, stepdad and two brothers. My cousins, aunts, uncles and grandparents came along, too. It was so many of us that my stepdad joked we were refugees. But we always ended up going back to New Orleans with our homes unscathed. Little did we know that Katrina would change our lives forever.
We shacked up at the Comfort Inn on the north side of Houston. We hung out by the pool, went to the mall and even visited relatives who lived in the area. We kids hung out in the computer room at the hotel, and discovered that some of the other kids there were from New Orleans, too. We flocked to the computer room every chance we got. We were technically on a break from school, but somehow spending time with those kids in the computer room felt similar to hanging in the computer lab at my high school. Eventually, the hotel staff banned us from the room.
After a few days, we were running out of money and were eager to get back to our homes. Incessant news coverage made the situation look bleaker than ever and we were all scared that we'd have nothing to go home to.
My auntie Connie called us to her room to look at how high the water had risen. The water was so high that Circle Food Store, a sixth ward grocery staple, was nearly covered with water and all we could see was the blue and white Circle Food Store sign. From that moment, the room got silent because we knew that auntie Pam lived about five or six blocks from the store. If Circle was flooded, we just knew that auntie Pam's house was flooded, too.
I remember thinking: would I ever see my friends again? What's going to happen to the city? What about my other aunts, uncles and cousins who evacuated to Atlanta? Would we see them? I literally saw my grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins about as much as I saw my mama. We were the definition of a close-knit family. To think that I might only see them for holidays or special occasions weighed heavily on my heart.
A couple days into September 2005, after the water receded, we were allowed to go back to New Orleans to review the damage.
We only had a few hours to get some things, if there was anything to get, and get back out of town. Each of us went to our respective neighborhoods to assess. When we got to General Meyer Avenue, I remember seeing huge tree branches at intersections, traffic lights flashing on and off, and dilapidated signs lying in parking lots.
We lived on the West Bank of New Orleans in Algiers. The homes I had seen so far were still standing, which gave me hope that our house would be alright. When we pulled into the driveway, the first thing we saw was a huge tree branch lying sideways across our roof. When we got inside, the house reeked of mildew and musk. When I opened the refrigerator, it felt like I had just passed an alley of garbage dumpsters. When I made my way past the kitchen, I noticed that huge tree branch had pierced through our roof right above the laundry room and caused water damage. The rest of the house, however, was untouched.
My grandparents called and said they had a little bit of water that got into their den, but otherwise everything was alright.
Many of my aunts and uncles said that nothing happened to their houses either, including auntie Pam, whose house was near Circle Food Store. I couldn't believe that her house was just as she left it, yet a few blocks away people lost everything. Those people included my auntie Linda, uncle Wilbert and cousin April.
A few hours after we gathered more clothes and valuables, we went to see April's house in Gentilly. While many of the houses in Gentilly were still standing and looked fine on the outside, the inside had so much water damage and mildew that nothing could be saved. April and her three children lost everything. Not even her children's graduation pictures could be salvaged.
After assessing our damages, we made a quick turnaround right back to Houston. For a while, we didn't know when we'd be able to go back home for good. Then, the mayor declared the city to be unlivable and that's when we all scattered.
My immediate family went to live in Lake Charles, La. Some of my aunts, uncles and cousins stayed in Houston, and others went to Bryan, TX and Atlanta.
When it was time for us to go to Lake Charles, I hugged my cousins, cried and said, "We'll see each other soon." As my stepdad pulled off, I saw my cousin David standing by the hotel's window waving goodbye and I could not stop crying.
Eventually, our parents enrolled us in school in our respective cities. We made new friends and tried to make the best of our situation. I talked on the phone with my cousins Kia and David almost every day. We took occasional trips to Houston on the weekends, which were some of the best times of my post-Katrina life.
From September 2005 to December 2005, I went to LaGrange High School, a public school in Lake Charles. Up until that time, I only attended all-black Catholic schools, one of which had my grandma as secretary and my cousins as schoolmates. Despite it being a different environment, I excelled at LaGrange High School, even though it was for a short time. I remember making A's on all of my English II assignments in Ms. Sonnier's class.
While I was in school in Lake Charles, New Orleans was in recovery. Natives moved back, rebuilt their homes and things were starting to look up for the Big Easy. My grandparents and other relatives also moved back home. Schools even opened up again, including my elementary school and high school. In January 2006, my relatives and I went back to our schools and things were getting back to normal, slowly but surely.
I can't believe it's been ten years since Hurricane Katrina touched down in New Orleans. I know my story is nowhere near as tragic as others have been. We were fortunate enough not to have stayed in the Superdome or the Convention Center under horrific conditions. We didn't lose any loved ones, and we weren't bused to foreign cities and forcibly separated from each other. Most of my family are still living in New Orleans and refuse to be anyplace else.
Job prospects and graduate school brought me to Chicago, but no matter where my journey takes me, I'll always be a native New Orleanian.