June 02, 2006
SITBB Vault: "Whose Blood? Whose Fields?"
| Hurricane season is upon us again. Like many Americans, when I started hearing that phrase recently, my thoughts went immediately to Katrina, Rita and the Gulf Coast. All is still not well in the region for many many people. Just the other day I was saddened to read here (pdf) that the New Orleans middle school named in honor of my grandmother's cousin--reopenned briefly--will be shutting its doors for good, unable to recover from the losses of funds and students.
In this post from last fall I said I needed a healthy dose of anger. Months after the storms hit, I am awash in fresh waves of anger every time I hear previously untold stories, such as this one about youth who were being held at the Orleans Parish Prison when the hurricane hit. But in the post below I also mentioned needing to feel hope--and certainly I have had glimpses of that over the last several months: here, for example, in a story of a local college's attempt to teach about and learn from our recent past. Wynton Marsalis, by the way, will be producing a live TV special in New Orleans, "New Orleans: Rebuilding the Soul of America One Year Later." (Originally posted September 7, 2005.) |
Trouble in our own land, crimes against the human soul
far too large for any describing words to hold.
If my musical inspiration of the day yesterday was "Late Registration," mine for today is Wynton Marsalis's Pulitzer winning "Blood on the Fields."
I have owned the three-CD box set of this composition since its release eight years ago. I have listened to the whole thing only maybe six times. Total.
Today I put it on and listened to the whole thing. It was the first time I played it for my children. I thought now was a good time to listen to this piece by one of New Orleans' most famous natives. I first listened to his rendition of "Do You Know What It Means to Miss New Orleans" from the "Live at Blues Alley" discs (where, incidently, I was fortunate enough to hear him perform live).
But that sweet tune left me wanting.
It is too easy in all this for us to talk only about sadness, regret, loss. Missing. I needed to supplement these emotions of mine with painful memory. And anger.
Those are usually the emotions I have felt following my previous half dozen times listening to "Blood." It has always been an emotionally wrenching experience. I have usually emerged from my earphones, almost three hours after putting them on, slightly dazed...emotionally drained. Exhausted, as if I were the one making the journey across the waters, toiling in the hot sun.
I think I hear a drum. I think I hear a drum
Playing, proudly, pounding, saying softly, come
I have also, however, been in need of another emotion: Hope. Which is why I have linked to information about relief efforts. Which is why I rejoice in the stories of overcoming adversity that are dotting news reports in the midst of stories of corruption, mismanagement, misery, and death.
But one of the main things I hope for is that we do not decide to trade our sadness, indignation and anger for hope. None of these are mutually exclusive. Hope alone likely will not make anything better for the dispossessed from the Gulf region following Katrina. Or for the dispossessed in our own backyards.
Sometimes we need to hold onto a little anger. Put it to good use.
Freedom is no simple thing but all you need to know
Freedom's in the trying...
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