I remember asking God to change New Orleans for the better. You know the kind of change that would bring about a revolution or revival for the renewal of the city. Remember the saying, \"Watch what you pray for!\" I wanted to see the drug dealers run out of town, the chance for the elderly matriarchs and patriarchs of our neighborhood to feel safe to sit outside on their porches again and to see the children of the New Orleans Public School system get a better education and no longer be the game-pieces in the game of corrupt school politics played by many selfish leaders within the system. I didn\'t know God would bring the change so radically and so soon. \r\n\r\n I recently returned home to New Orleans from LSU in Baton Rouge after graduating this past May. Returning home during the summer I saw some things remained constant but much of the fabric and face of the city seemed to be deteriorating. I no longer recognized the place I called home all my life. What was happening to my hometown? \r\n\r\n On Canal Street, near the heart of the area starting at Rampart and Canal Street, it seemed the street had lost its pulse and its vigor. I had to fight back tears because as a child growing up this was a major highlight of the city. You could take a Saturday afternoon and go to Krauss Department Store and find the best shoes, sleepwear or fabrics for sewing, grab a dessert inside or go down the street to Woolworth\'s and dine at one of the last few diner /drug stores and sit down at the counter and have lunch. Not just any kind of lunch but the best red beans and rice on Monday or a juicy hamburger anytime. You know \"good eating\" is a vital part of who we are in New Orleans because we can boast the best cooks and unrivaled cuisine in the world. \r\n\r\n There was also the Joy Movie Theatre or the Loews State Theatre on weekends. Don\'t forget D.H. Holmes and Maison Blanche Department Stores. You could find any and everything of the best quality in those stores. The commonality of all these places is that they were all gone, standing as vacant run down buildings before Hurricane Katrina. I felt the city slipping away even then. Then came Hurricane Katrina and our lives were changed in an instant. \r\n\r\n Before Katrina I wanted for years to get out of New Orleans and start a new life but something just kept pulling me back home. It wasn\'t the heat and humidity that\'s for sure! Something kept holding me back there. New Orleans is magnetic in that way. It was so hard for New Orleanians to leave and stay out of New Orleans. I always dreamed of going away to school and I did, twice. \r\n\r\n I always joked that since jobs were so scarce in Louisiana and that New Orleans was too laid back for me, when I graduated college I would have a degree in one hand and a plane ticket in the other. However, deep down inside I knew I would miss New Orleans, my family and I would forever be tied to the city emotionally, historically, socially and culturally. \r\n\r\n A part of me always wanted to brag about my hometown even though I was angry with the city and its seemingly perpetual neglect of its residents. Memories of growing up in New Orleans have tremendously filled my mind lately. I realized how much I love New Orleans because my history is there, my family was there and my childhood memories of growing up and coming of age were all there in that city that secretly cried out under hidden suffocated tears and groans that revealed its grief to the world on August 29, 2005. \r\n\r\n New Orleans had become a lady forced to put on the pretty face, best clothes, pull out the best china for the guests and never let the visitor know what\'s going on in the other rooms. She said, \"I\'ll smile for you, I\'ll dance for you, I\'ll fix you a pot of gumbo, jambalaya and powdered beignets, just to make you happy for your short time here and when you leave you will not have seen what was in the other rooms. I\'ll hide behind my \"Let the Good Times Roll\" and when you only see the parts of me that make you happy and comfortable, you can go home with your souvenirs and believe I\'m okay because I wear the mask that asthetically and cosmetically shield you from my true face and the realities of oppression and corruption that would make you uncomfortable. \r\n \r\n After three weeks of viewing the television news shows as my window to my hometown, I finally had the chance to return to the city to view the damage and see my family who were now living with my uncle in LaPlace, Louisiana. I was so anxious to return home. Writing is a part of my healing process. Here are a few excerpts from my journal about my first journey back home.\r\n\r\n\r\nOctober 1, 2005\r\n My big sister, Roloma, and I finally got to go back to the house on Monroe Street in the Mid City Area. Driving on the interstate to the neighborhood, we saw a prelude of what was to come. I knew our neighborhood was near the 17th Street Canal and was said to have had very high flood waters. The interstate appeared fragile and bruised. Pieces of the side of the interstate flew off as if they were the weight of loose leaf paper or feathers in the wind. \r\n\r\n While riding along the highway, we saw one strip of the interstate fly off directly in front the car and we both gasped for breath because we didn\'t know whether we would hit it head on or swerve into another lane. Thank God my sister was driving and she drove directly into it and we held our breath, and the Lord made sure we simply rode over it and kept going. We exhaled and thanked God it did not hit the window. \r\n\r\n Our heads turned constantly to view the sights around us. On the side of the road lay sections of a bridge and interstate stacked upon each other face down like unwanted books. The once beautiful Galleria office building in Metairie was defaced with broken glass windows. \r\n \r\n As we approached Airline Hwy the sides of the road looked foreign. There was greenery that no longer was green but yellow and didn\'t look like it belonged there before. We passed a Trophy Shop near home that had collapsed with its roof caved in resting in split sections. The streets appeared brown, yellow and grey. The stench got stronger and the streets emptier. We expected to see law enforcement officers stopping us and asking for identification, but no one was there. \r\n\r\n We turned the corner into a seemingly apocalyptic scene out of a movie. A child\'s tricycle sat overturned on the curb, a reminder of life, collectively, young and old, that once existed in our neighborhood. The neighborhood appeared dismal and desolate. Everything was discolored and grey. Grey seemed to represent the death and abandonment that befell the city. Our streets and homes resembled an abandoned post war zone. \r\n\r\n\r\nThe front of our home was marked in bright orange writing with the coded message that contained an X with the date the house was checked and the number zero for the number of bodies found inside. The other letters or codes in the X were unknown to us. This is now a familiar and sobering symbol on our homes that signifies the reality of survival and death surrounding this tragedy. The cars were grey and cloudy regradless of what their original color was. Grey seemed to visually dominate everything. \r\n\r\n As we got out of the car, my sister realized she had on the wrong shoes. Open sandals were not a good idea to wear. We proceeded nonetheless in outfits and shoes that we both were tired of seeing each other in. After having lost all our clothes, we were grateful to be alive and together. We saw a few other families in their vehicles passing by, with disbelief on their faces, as they looked at the ruins of the neighborhood we all called home all our lives. After they left the street fell completely silent. The silence told a story of its own. \r\n\r\n As I stood taking pictures of the damage outside the house, my heart sank. I couldn\'t belive this was once the place I learned to ride a bike and skate in my big sister\'s skates that were three times my size. This was the same place as little girls where we played jacks and sang Lisa Lisa & Cult Jam\'s \"All Cried Out\" to the top of our lungs outside on the porch during summer nights. We got sweet frozen cups from Mrs. Jones across the street for 25 cents and made frequent trips to Ms. Wanda\'s grocery store for our favorite candy, chips and pig lips. I could hear the gaiety and laughter again. \r\n\r\n The vitality of the generations of children and families that looked out for one another and were the warm freehearted people that made New Orleans a special place. Where are they know? We haven\'t been able to contact hardly anyone. Maybe some are in Texas, northern Louisiana, or Atlanta. The zero body counts on most of the homes gave me some comfort. \r\n\r\n We tried to walk into the house but both front doors( we lived in a classic New Orleans shotgun home) were blocked by debris and our possessions that were damaged had been violently thrown all over the place. The smell was strong like that of a wilderness or bayou but not totally unbearable. You could smell the wetness and see the flies buzzing around. The smell stayed with me and on my clothes even after we left Louisiana later that day. \r\n\r\n We could only peek through a space from the side of the doors. An old treasured picture of my great-grandmother sat on the wall unscathed in my grandmother\'s living room. We couldn\'t get to it that day. We left the house that day and I felt a bit of closure that I really needed. \r\n\r\n I believe God will bless our city, revive it and rebuild it bigger and better than before. It is interesting that Katrina means \"purification\". I know this is a tragedy but God will bring so much good out of it. New Orleans needed a new start that would not have come with the level of support and change that is and shall be implemented. \r\n\r\n Katrina revealed the ugly realities that no one wanted to deal with in New Orleans. Now the oppression and corruption has been challenged. Never in my wildest dreams did I ever think something of this magnitude would materialize in my personal life. We will forever be changed by this storm that \"hit home\" literally. \r\n\r\nTawn Fox