[Original post: October 4, 2005]
I thought those of you who sent Target gift cards might want to know how the money was spent. (Don’t worry: I have not decked myself out in head-to-toe Isaac Mizrahi, accessorized with blue-handled Michael Graves kitchen implements.)
Yesterday we drove to the Garan shelter in Marksville to find out what was needed this week, but the shelter had closed the day before. Shelters are consolidating right now, so the evacuees still living there have been dispatched to nearby faux-metropolis Alexandria. Most are staying in the Riverfront Center, which faces the giant levee of the Red River. This is a conference facility that housed 425 evacuees on Sunday; the number went down on Monday as some people moved out, with another 150 new arrivals expected that night. The Red Cross volunteers told us that as more shelters close, they expect to reach their capacity of 850 pretty soon.
It’s a better environment that Garan – i.e. not a factory – but people are still sleeping in a communal room filled with cots and borrowed belongings. The mealtime schedule, posted on a piece of cardboard, includes a special early breakfast for school children. Most people there look bored, or stunned, or simply exhausted. I’ve felt anxious and grumpy enough this month staying at Slowness. If I had to sleep every night in a huge room full of strangers, using communal bathrooms, told when I can eat, standing in line whenever I need to get diapers or tampons or toilet paper, and checked in and out of the building by the National Guard, I’d be more than miserable. Many of these evacuees will not be able to go home for months. Many have nothing to go home to.
For the Garan shelter, we bought five giant bottles of laundry detergent for use in the sole communal washing machine, and one hundred towels.
For the Alexandria shelter, after talking yesterday to the young Red Cross people at the front desk, we bought: a DVD player, a microwave oven, two basketballs, two footballs, two (Halloween-themed) play balls, two long jump ropes, a pump, ten extension cords, four big packs of AA batteries, five towels and, with the leftover money, two big packs of Halloween candy.
As you can tell by the second shopping list, boredom is a major factor there, especially for kids.
All of these things were appreciated so much at the shelters: everything will be put to good use. The volunteer who took the towels from us was nearly skipping with happiness, because that was a dire need at Garan. I’m really, really grateful to those of you who sent Target cards. Thank you so much.
Comments