I arrived at the hotel, drenched. In truth I was no more drenched than when I started out because the body can absorb just so much before new rain just falls off. But the front-desk did not laugh at me. I would not have taken offense, I looked silly. Senior-citizen, sandals and white socks, shorts and t-shirt and a backpack, drenched, asks for a room. I would have laughed!
I checked into room 621, undressed, dried off, filled my tub and sink with water as directed, got dressed and went out. The rains had stopped. From the time I had arrived and changed my clothes until I went to sleep, perhaps 1:00am, the skies were clear and free from rain. I had driven through a rain-storm that was merely a storm before the storm; had I waited, I'd have gotten to the hotel dry. I didn't care. This was my new home-base from which to be a storm-observer. The room was large, and the bed was SO comfy! But I went Coca-Cola-less that evening, the first REAL sign of hardships to be endured.
I woke up the next morning, Monday August 29th, early. In truth I was wakened. Hurricane Katrina was beating furiously on my windows, making quite a racket. Not only was the storm whistling, it was pounding. I rolled over and went back to sleep. But of course the storm was too loud to allow me to do that. So I began to get up. Then I changed my mind again. But the storm was not going to let me go back to sleep. So I got up, got dressed, brushed my teeth and went out into the hallway. It must have been before 7:00am. Those who know me know how extraordinary it is for me to be awake voluntarily at 7:00am. It was the last time I was to sleep on that wonderful bed!
I spent that exhausted morning in safety on my floor's hallway, listening to the storm howl outside and beat on windows. I had a view of the lobby six stories below and of two of the three building-high windows that enclosed the hotel's atrium. I listened to Katrina howl outside; I listened to her slam unknown objects against the side of the hotel; I listened to her beat on those great windows and smash more than half of them; I listened to her scream through the doorways of rooms whose windows she had destroyed by the force of her winds, not by hurling anything against them; and I watched all this from the serene comfort of my hotel's hallway. Not once did I conjure up the damage Katrina was wreaking, not merely at the hotel, but elsewhere, particularly in vulnerab;le New Orleans. To be honest, this was exciting to me! My only great needs were occasional hunger and urges for Coke.
to Room 549
Monday 8/29
|
|
|
|||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|