[EDITOR'S NOTE: One year after Hurricane Katrina, Ball State alumna Kimberly Robinson continues to cope with the changes the disaster brought into her life. From rebuilding her family home, to finishing graduate school, to starting a new job, Katrina changed everything.
Robinson spoke with News Editor Erin Moody to describe her experiences since the hurricane hit.]
The last part of grad school was really important to me because I thought I would have to drop out. Everybody up there was really helpful, keeping me from killing myself, because that's not cool.
Back to New Orleans
The hurricane was in August. It was like should I stay, should I go, should I stay, should I go? What am I going to do? So I came back (to Muncie) and basically got into this severe depression. Stress, anxiety, my hair started falling out, I broke out in hives all over my body, my arms, neck, legs, chest. Everything itched like crazy - I was scratching welts into my arms. I wouldn't leave my house, wouldn't fall asleep until 6 o'clock in the morning because I was so wigged out. I talked to my mom like 15 times a day. But everyone in the Journalism Department and the administration was really, really helpful and they kept me from basically giving up. They had patience with me and knew that I had to go back and forth to home a lot.
I went back in December, and that's because I have never not spent a Christmas with my family. I thought that if I didn't spend Christmas with them then I would just die. If I have to spend Christmas by myself in Muncie, I'm going to kill myself for real. That's a really sad thing to say, but oh well, it was true. It was how I felt at the time. I went home and stayed home for a couple days and it wasn't as bad. I was like "mom, it's not that bad, it's not that bad, it's not as bad as you think it is."
My mom had gotten some contractors to come in and work on the house. So my mom was like, "Let's go drive around and see what it looks like." The city looked like some crap. But ok, September, October, November, December, it's only been four months from the hurricane, but the city still looks like crap though. We drove around and it was still desolate in large areas of the neighborhood. We played this game, but it's a real sick morbid game. We played the "Oh, oh, you know what used to be there? Oh, that used to be right there. Remember that time when I was right there?" I was like we're sick. That was it, we just spent hours in the car driving around like "Ohhh, yeah, I remember that. That's not there anymore, what did that use to be?" It was really upsetting. We're crazy. It was reminiscing. This is my own sick, twisted way of dealing with it. Just watching it and driving by.
My mom and my dad made me drive down to the 9th Ward, and I was like "Please don't make me do it, please don't make me do it." So we drive down there, and I was like "What are we looking at? There's nothing there." But she still wanted to go see it because my mom grew up in Mississippi, but when she moved to the city in the '60s, she lived in the 9th Ward with my great aunt, who by the way, has refused to come back.
None of my friends who have evacuated have come back. They are all still gone and I don't think they are coming back. They've established lives and everything, in Texas, Arizona, there's others in Georgia - they're not coming back. So we drove around and there was nothing. I was like, "Mom, you know what, if there's a random nail in the ground or something because a house fell apart, and our tire gets blown, we're stuck down here. For real, because there's no one else down here besides us. And the abandoned houses and wreckage." Then we drove by the 17th Street Canal, because I went to school right by there. My high school is maybe a couple blocks from there and they didn't stand a chance. Please don't let television fool you, everybody should be required to come down here.
The Contractors
My mom just moved back into her house, just like a month ago. She's been staying with my grandmother. My mom, even today, she finally is putting the last finishing touches on the house. Lighting, cabinets and a countertop for the kitchen. As a disclaimer for all of this, by no means am I ever trying to say that my story is worse than anybody else, because compared to what I know happened, we're doing great. I'll tell you about the contractors. The contractors basically swindled my mom out of $40,000. I mean, my mom is 65, she's older, and when you are 65 and you are faced with having to restart your entire life over, you are not having rational thoughts. I kept saying "Be careful mom, look these people up mom, do some background research, talk to people, find out." But I think she was so dead set on getting her house fixed that she just kind of was like "Okay."
They stole $40,000. They would do work and disappear for a couple of days. They would come back and do some work and disappear. Or then what they would do is they wouldn't do it right or break it. Or they would take something out of the house and be like, "Oh, we threw it away." "What do you mean you threw it away?" They would take out my mom's sink and it would just be gone. They swindled my mom and skipped town. My mom is still in a lawsuit. She's trying to track them down, because they skipped town with all her money. The roof they did wrong, they put the shingles on wrong, they didn't put the tiles right, they painted wrong.
They took advantage of my mom, and that's part of it I still haven't coped with. Even now, I'm even getting teary-eyed talking about it because that's the one part I can't talk about with my mom at all. When she calls me to talk about it, I have to get off the phone with her because I just can't deal with it. I hold myself responsible. If I had moved back home then this wouldn't have happened. My mom was like "No, don't say that Kim. No, what do you know about contracting and building a house?" I was like, "Nothing, but I have enough wherewithal to walk up to you and be like what are you doing? What is that? Why are you painting it like that? How long's that going to take? Well, do you have to dry it?" That's what I did when I went home in December. They didn't like me, they told me that I had a mouth on me. "Yes I do. 'Cause you're not about to come in here and mess over my mom." But they still did, and I couldn't be there.
So basically, she's out $40,000. That was the money they took, that she gave them to fix the house. Either they didn't do it, or they said they did it, or they only halfway did it or whatever they did was wrong. So now my mom has to repay someone else to fix her house. That's the process that she's in right now. So she's paying to get her house fixed twice. They just threw stuff away. I'd be like "Mom, where's the toilet?" "They threw it away." "What do you mean threw the toilet away? What did they do with it?" They just took it. My mom extended her open arms to these people. She bought them food if they were hungry. She went and hauled all the material. If they were like "We need tile," she'd give them $500 to go get it and they'd never go. Then she'd have to go get it and buy it. Then carry it in her car back to the house. They had a truck, and they'd just vanish, and then they'd come back. They said they were from Kansas City, and come to find out they were like from the Gulf Coast.
My mom is all tied up in that with her insurance company, and with the state people who regulate people who operate without licenses, and contracts. It's crazy. It's crazy and I do not talk about it with her, because I can't wrap my brain around it. $40,000, that's just not a small sum of money for you to skip out on. The people that my mom originally hired, it was five of them. It took them months to do one thing. The new guy's name is Robert. He'll do it in two days. You tell him what he needs to do, he'll write up a receipt, he'll tell you how much it costs and he'll do it. Done. He's a great guy. When I went home again in May, I sat down with him and I was frank. "Look, you will not mess over my mother. You won't. 'Cause I will find you. I'm not going through this again." He's like, "I'm going to take care of this," and I was like "No, seriously, for real. I'm not going through this again. If you have plans to mess her over, you need to tell me right now. 'Cause I'm not dealing with it. Give me your cell phone number, your contact information, so I can track you down."
My mom was like, "Kim, if another hurricane comes, I can't do it again. I can't. I probably won't live through it, let alone be able to fix the house again. It's up to you." They built our fence, and then the fence fell down randomly in the middle of the day. It was shoddy work; it was crap. My mom got straight swindled. She's tied up with all the attorneys and all the people, and who has the money to file lawsuits? Nobody. I don't even know as much as I probably should, because I can't even talk about it with her because it makes my chest hurt. I physically get sick. I can't deal with this right now.
Stressed and depressed
When I finally got out of all the crazy, depression, I finally was like "I'm going to graduate." I don't think I really came out of my funk until about March. I finally was leaving my house and going places and actually doing stuff. People thought I had moved, 'cause I was like "I just can't leave my house right now." I started going to the doctor, to the counselor. When my arm started itching, it was one arm. My left arm itched. I was randomly watching TV scratching my arm. The next day my right arm itched, and they both itched in the same place. Then my neck started itching.
So I'm going to the doctor, and I was like my arm's itching. I don't really understand. He was like "What else is going on?" I was like "My hair's kind of falling out on the side, I don't really go to sleep until about six in the morning and I just kind of stare at the news and watch the hurricane stuff all day." He's like, "It's stress, it's anxiety, it's depression. Your anxiety and stress has manifested itself physically." He wanted to put me on medicine, and I was like, "No, not really trying to go there. You have anything to stop my arm from itching? Because it's really unattractive to scratch yourself in public." He's like "I can give you hydrocortisone cream, but it really won't do anything. You have to stop the stress. No TV, no internet, no cell phone two hours after you wake up and two hours before you go to sleep. You are overstimulated. Read a book, take a bath, take a walk, exercise."
I was literally in bed at 4:30 in the morning screaming and crying because my entire body was itching. All my arms, my legs, my back, my chest. I'm crying. I'm like "Jesus, really, I think I'm going crazy and I really can't afford to." I attribute to God, period. I really thought I was losing my mind. I would wake up in the morning, and sit in the chair in my living room and just sit there. Literally, sit there for 12 hours, all day, and not leave my house. Simple stuff like getting dressed and brushing my teeth was too much for me. I think that was my breaking point. I was like "God really, I really need to not be crazy. Because I really have to graduate."
Everybody - all the administration and Journalism Department, and even in the Sociology Department - they were so helpful, and they were so patient. They were saying "We understand that you are going through something and we will do our best to work with you." And they did. I so appreciate that, and I probably could not have gotten out of school without that. I think maybe around March, I was like "Okay, I really have to leave school, I have to graduate."
Effect on life
I am in Washington, D.C., well, I'm living in Dale City (Va.), working at an educational center. I think watching the hurricane, and the news coverage and being a reporter, I think it kind of messed me up. I never want to have to cover anything like a life tragedy for anybody anymore and I need something that is very non-stressful. I get to bounce around and be happy.
I went back in May, and then I went back to my high school. I found my principal, the administration. I walked down the halls looking at pictures. It was so sad cause my school caught 12, 15 feet of water. They were about a block away from the 17th Street Canal. I bought over $100 worth of merchandise in our bookstore, me and my other friends I went to high school with. We just felt so sad, and just wanted to help the school out anyway we could, just by being alumni. We sat and talked with the principal. We walked up and down the halls, stuff is still gutted out and it still smells like mildew. It's still there, but I felt bad for girls who were seniors. They had to come and miss senior year.
So I'm living up here. I'm good. It kind of changed my whole outlook on life. My apartment is on the third floor and I think I did that subconsciously. When I went to apartments, I said "What do you have that's not a basement, or a first floor, or a second floor? I need to live on the top." Just in case there is a freak flood, I want my house up. I won't drown. They are like, "Kim, water's not going to reach the third floor of your apartment." Oh contraire! It could, I'm just saying. I don't know if it floods in Virginia, but I'm being on the safe side.
Friends
Nothing, they have nothing. They started new lives. Period. One of my friends, her name is Cori, she lost everything. Her mom lost everything, her grandma lost everything, her sister lost everything, her uncle drowned in the hurricane. She's like, "I have nothing." She lived on the third floor, so her rational after she got back from Houston was "Oh, I live on the third floor, and I live in Jefferson Parish, so I'm okay." When she drove up to her apartment complex, they were tearing it down. No phone call, not like she could really get in touch with anybody. No nothing, no letter in the mail, no by the way, come get your stuff. They tore it down. She was in there cursing and screaming "What are you doing." They were like, "The roof kind of leaked, so we are tearing it down." So she has nothing.
I was on the phone with her the other day and her dog was chewing on something, tearing something up. You could hear in her voice, she was like "Stop doing that, I have worked too hard to have this." She had to start from scratch. She's like, "I have shoes, the clothes on my back and my family." I think they have a house, she has an apartment, but they moved to Atlanta. When she went home she's like "My refrigerator is in my bedroom, the couch is in the kitchen, and the dog was dead in the bathroom. There was nothing Kim, nothing." I drove past her house, and it just kills me because we used to sit outside on the steps.
What am I doing now? I'm living. The one year anniversary is coming up. I watched the Spike Lee documentary on when the levee's broke. I had fully prepared myself to be crying, curled up in a ball and depressed. But then I finally was like, "You know what Kim, you've been through a hell of a lot. Suck it up, watch it, move on." I wasn't sad. I was angry. I was so irate. I was irate. When I went home in May it still was like an atomic bomb dropped on the city. There's no improvement. It still looks like crap. It looks like nothing. I pass through New Orleans east and there's nothing. So the documentary made me angry. I love it, need to buy it on dvd - Spike Lee's a genius. I love him, he should get an Oscar. It just really pissed me off because it felt like people really just forgot about us. We got neglected and people were like that's okay. They'll be okay.
Future of New Orleans
It's going to be really boring and really white. Really like the Hamptons meet Disney World, and really bland, boring and plain. I'm sorry, the culture that made up New Orleans was black people. Period. There were Creole, and there were black and French, and there were Hispanics, and all that was the city. That was going to get po'boys at 3 o'clock in the morning. That was New Orleans, that was watching the Indians dance underneath the bridge for Mardi Gras. The beat, the music and the people, You can't replace that. That's cultural, that's passed down. That's gone because three-fourths of the population is not there.
Then they are talking about how all the prices have gone up, and about how everything is so much more expensive and nobody can afford to live there. Like all the people in the 9th Ward. Okay, everybody was poor, but all the people in the 9th Ward probably owned their houses because their houses have been in the family for generations. So you tear down their house, then what? What are you going to do? Are they going to come back? Can they build it? No. Do they have the money to? Probably not. That's why I get mad. New Orleans is going to be garbage and plain. It makes me sad. I want my kids to understand how great New Orleans was, ' cause I think it's dead. You can't get that back. That's one of those things that grows. It's culture. It's not the buildings, though granted the buildings are great, and the tourist places are great. But the way people talk is different. Our sayings are different. We say make groceries. No one else says that. Just random stuff that you can't get, and you are not going to bring back. It's a people, it's a culture.
Can't move back
My dad got really ill. He's been in and out of the hospital for the last year. When they came up to visit me for my graduation, they couldn't even go because my dad was in the hospital. He got sick on the way up there and they had to keep him in the hospital for a week. My dad's old. He has congestive heart failure, he's 70. I'm sure it (the hurricane) did (add stress). Life is real.
I always told myself I was going to move back. I'm going to move back. I'm going to live in New Orleans, going to have my kids understand what it means to live in the south. Somewhere around earlier this month I was like, "You know what, I am never going back." Every time I move I keep getting farther and farther away. I was just like, I just don't see how, it's so depressing. My mom, she doesn't blame me. My dad, he hates it and he wants me to move home. He tells me that just about every time I talk with him on the phone, that I should be there. My mom's like "Fine, get away." My mom, subconsciously, she wants to move. I know she does. She's made a couple of comments, like "I wish I could just sell it and move, just not be here anymore." But that's easier said than done. You live somewhere for 40 years, it's kind of hard to move on.
I had this grand dream of teaching, maybe back at my high school and my daughter going to my high school. Having my kids understand crawfish boils, being under the bridge at Mardi Grad and raising them up in a New Orleans way. But now I don't see how that's going to happen. Not unless they get the school systems back in order. When I told one of my cousins that I wasn't going to move back, she's like "I know. You didn't know, but I knew."
I just can't. It physically pains me to think about what it's like to live there. My dad's like, "What are you going to do with the house, because the house is paid for." "Rent it out." Even the allure of a beautiful, paid-for home is not enough for me. I'd rather pay a mortgage for the next 30 years. Maybe I will change when I have kids and get married. But I just don't see how. There's a lot of memories down there. I spent like my whole life there. It's dead. It is dead, dead deep.
I haven't really done anything since the hurricane. That's a piece of the story, what have I done, what do I do? God, I've got to move on to Memphis (Tenn.), or Charlotte (N.C.), get married, have some kids, visit New Orleans every now and then, and Mississippi, go to Homecoming in October. New Orleans survived the hurricane. We didn't survive the flood. And the non-rescue attempt. So the only thing that "saved" New Orleans is that the hurricane moved east a little bit, through Hattiesburg (Miss.).
In Virginia
There's a lot of random people up here who are from Mississippi. I think a couple of them moved up here before the hurricane. We are all like, "Hey are going back?" "Hey, I don't think so." There was a guy in my parking lot with Louisiana drivers tag. I stopped him and I blew my horn. I was like "Roll your window down, where are you from? Why? Who? Why are you here? What's your story?" As soon as he opened his mouth and that New Orleans accent came out, I just wanted to jump through the car and give him a hug. "Oh my God I love you, we have to hang out in New Orleans for life." It's that serious. It's that serious.
Whenever I do get a Virginia license plate, which I was supposed to have done like 60 days ago, I'll probably get NAWLINS on the back of my license plate. My mom thinks it's a waste of money. I'm very much New Orleans oriented up here. I want a tattoo. I want to put something on my back that's like New Orleans. Not the actual word, but like a fleur de lis or something like that. One of my friends got one. Or a magnolia, which is the Louisiana and Mississippi state flower. Just something permanent. My mom is like "You are crazy, there is something wrong with you." I need to carry it with me for the rest of my life.
An entire city
I don't even blame the hurricane anymore. That's an act of God. I can't really be mad at God. I blame the lack of rescue. Somebody was sleeping on the job. Period. So that's who I blame. There's billions of dollars that have been allocated to New Orleans. Where? Cause I haven't seen it. They are talking about all the paperwork you have to go through just to get federal funding for something. It'll be 50 years later and there will still be some garbage. I want to be hopeful, I really do. I want to be optimistic. Like when it first happened we were like, in 5, 10 years, this will be great. They'll fix the schools and they will build brand new houses. How's that for not being realistic?. It's an entire city. Not a house, not a neighborhood, not a block, not a street - a city. I don't even know what it's like. Like nothing. No parks, no theatres, no nothing. Get it together people.
Jefferson Parish is a little bit okay - that's where my mom lives. She works and she does her thing. My dad sits around and lets life happen. It's good, I mean compared to what we could be like. I went home and I got my friend Cori, the one that lost everything. We went to my house and my mom was complaining to Cori. I was like "Mom, do you want to complain to someone who lost everything while you are standing in front of your house? Don't ever complain, don't ever open your mouth. Don't ever be upset about anything else that happens, because you could be in Houston somewhere living in a shelter."
Putting it together
It aged her hard. When I saw my mom in December when I got off the plane I cried. I bawled. In four months she aged 10 years. I'm not exaggerating. When I said that to my dad he said "Your mom is really starting to show her age." I was like "You would too, if your life fell apart." But hey, she's a trooper, I'll give her that. She talks too much about it, she drives me crazy. I can't wait for this house to get together.
I haven't even seen the house since it's been totally redone. In May it was nice. We had new tiles, but there was furniture and boxes everywhere. The only thing set up right now in the house, I think, is my mom's bed. Everything else was still on top of tables. Even if the house is fixed, it's not set up. I take a shower, I go to sleep, I watch some TV. That's it. There's nothing set up or put together in the house at all.
I still haven't gone through my stuff. I went home and I saw my books on the table. I'm so mad about my books. They're gone. I love to read, so every single book I've ever read in my entire life, literally, either is in this apartment in Dale City or in New Orleans. They got ruined, and I was like "Don't throw them away," but my mom's like "Kim, they are black. They are covered in black mold."
I live near my mom's sister, my cousin, my uncle. It's good, she's like my pretend mom. They live three minutes away. I joined a church up here, cause I realized I really need to go to church eight days out of the week so I don't go crazy. None of this could have been done without lots and lots of Jesus. I don't think I could have. My mom is like "You need Jesus, or therapy or something. You are worrying me." She goes to church and prays a lot. My whole family does. I go to my grandma's house and get baptized once again, 'cause she's Jesus's best friend.
One year
The profile pictures are changing on Facebook and MySpace. It's changing to like pictures of the hurricane, or pictures of the Spike Lee documentary. It's about that time. I knew it was going to happen. My picture on Facebook is going to be something like "rest in peace New Orleans, 1718-2005." It's been changing since like last week. It'll just be like "Wow, they really forgot about us." That's just it, people really just forgot about us. We got straight screwed over. We are chatting it up since I can't talk to people like I want to. We are sending messages back and forth.
I've overcome a lot, I really have. I could have let it kill me. I realized that I'm thankful I didn't move back home. 'Cause that was not the best plan for me. My dad, one of his favorite sayings is self-preservation beats the world. He's like "Kim, self preservation." So I had to do what was best for me and move away and live a life independent of the city. Just 'cause the city died doesn't mean I have to die too.
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