Five Years Ago Today
Hurricane Harvey hit us August 25, 2017. This pic was taken by my
brother outside a shopping mall that had been gutted. Those are bales
of clothing in the lot, free for those in need. The grown man clutching
a teddy bear seems to have got his cast off pants from Junior Samples.
But - those are 600 dollar boots he's wearing. I think this derelict
is rooting through charity items looking for really cool t-shirts. I
got several cases of emergency food from the army, and God Almighty did
it suck. That stuff made the old C rations look like the morning after
Halloween. I still have most of the free food, no coffee or tea
included, the candy was Skittles, bad news all the way. The difference
between a crescent wrench and the emergency food we got was that you
could eat a crescent wrench if you had to. I'm not complaining, I
stored up lots of food and liquor and tobacco before the 'cane hit. Not
for me the way of improvident fools. I stayed because I could not
leave my cats, and someone had to be there to throw open an outside door
if it came to that. I put on my best clothes and shaved so that when
they found me under all that mud months later people would know I was a
gent. The only radio station to stay on the air for much of the blow
was KLUX, a Catholic easy listening channel. I was running up and down
stairs moving the few possessions I care about shrieking with fear to
the mellow sounds of Mantovani doing 'The Girl From Ipanema' and Bert
Kaempfert rockin' out with Swinging Safari. I later got good and drunk
and fell asleep with the house shaking like a dog shitting pork chop
bones.
“...and then, in dreaming,
The clouds methought would open and show riches
Ready to drop upon me, that when I waked
I cried to dream again.”
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