Saturday

Fred Bailey is our final Team Blogger.

Like most of the days in New Orleans for the Team From Fish, Day 6 started with sleepy people in work clothes wandering through the tidy halls of Ochsner Hospital, looking for coffee, tea, grits and whatever else they could find to fuel the labors that awaited them.

Having tired of the daily fare at Zucchini’s (which happened to be closed on the weekend), they ventured forth through the back halls to the employee cafeteria – the charming Southport Café. It not only sufficed to start the day, but the venturesome team even returned here for lunch after laboring in the hot sun for 5 hours (not all that creative a selection in this culinary capital of the southern region of the USA). And finally, on this Saturday morning, all of the team actually reported for our caravans to the work sites on time – Halleluiah campers!

We divided up again to conquer work that awaited us in Ferry Place and in the inner city at both First Street and Fourth Street. In each location, we saw the fruits of our labors. Bare exterior walls were now largely sided – neatly and attractively – with panels level and plum, freshly caulked and ready for the final prep and painting that future teams will apply. Fresh interior painting at all locations created a welcoming feeling for the teams that will be arriving to inherit our inertia and refine them further for future owners. Railings were installed, stairs were finished, closets were painted, windows were trimmed… our significant mark could be seen… our work for now was finished. A special part of the day was working along side some of the displaced families working to participate in the Habitat for Humanity rebuilding program.

We all convened in one of the Ferry Place houses for a site farewell. We gathered in front of a graphic David Merrell created of our church symbol gracing an interior wall – a drawing of a Fish and the words: “To know and share God’s grace in Jesus Christ.”















David with Kate Snider the new RHINO Coordinator.






And after six days of creation, the people rested.

First, there was a two-hour respite that had some soaking in freshly drawn baths, reportedly imbibing Coke and Bourbon… admittedly decadent behavior.

Your blogger went for a dip in the hotel pool. There he encountered a 70 something year old woman from the Gulf region of Mississippi. She spoke of the huge restorative impact that volunteers had made to her community which was still reeling and trying to recover from storm damage. She said that the impact of others coming to their aid was so inspiring that teams from her county are now preparing to head for Galveston to help that devastated region. They recognize that though they all have much less than they once did, they all have more than the folks from Galveston. As they couldn’t have survived without the outside assistance of total strangers, they feel inspired to return the favor. As she tottered across the pool apron with her walker (impeded a bit by her cigarette in hand) she asked me to please say thank you to our entire team... wow have we heard those words a lot in six days.

We exited our baths and swimming pool to return to our car pool. We brought our weak, weary and achy bodies to the Big Easy for a bit of R&R and camaraderie, determined to laissez les bon temps rollez.

Trimmed in our finest and armed with our newly acquired skills, we painted the town, opened new doors, nailed down plans for spectacular dining, admired the New Orleans architecture… with some of us paying particular attention to the railings, siding, stairs, trim….

We fanned out across the city dining in varied establishments including: Drago’s, The Gumbo Shop, K-Paul’s, The French Market Restaurant, Gallitois’ Restaurant, and come to think of it, including Charles Hair in the mix, virtually every other dining establishment in the city limits was fair game.

Because David suspected that we might all still be hungry, he brought us all to Café du Monde for a nightcap of beignets and coffee.






From there we traveled back to the St. Charles Avenue Presbyterian Church for closing reflections on the week.

Our thoughts included:
I all heard a chorus of gratitude throughout our stay.
Young people in the Rhino program and from our church inject all of us with great hope for the possibilities of the future.
It has been a week of reciprocity – we have gotten far more than we gave.
I’m impressed by the enormous commitment of the church that hosted us.
I feel humbled that giving so little has earned such considerable appreciation.
The scale of the devastation is so much larger than suspected.
Little by little… the impact of many is being felt.
This week we truly walked the talk of mission.
We met as virtual strangers on Monday and leave forever bonded by a common experience.
This was more than expected… I’m coming back! It was enormously “Full-filling”!
Being here with the people who will benefit and are benefiting from our charity represents zero degrees of separation – there is real grace in being face to face with those we are helping, unlike simply making a donation.

Day 6 is now drawing to a close. Tomorrow we exit physically, but a part of each one of us shall remain here at Ferry Place and downtown at First Street or Fourth Street. Our work has touched different neighborhoods. Different neighborhoods have touched us. Fresh coats of paint. Protective siding and fascia. New railings. Windows sealed and trimmed against the storms of the future. Doors that will be opened to guests and playmates… and closed to secure families of the future. A new neighborhood of hope emerges… and we had a hand in it. Future generations of children learning to aspire, feeling safe, loved and able to flourish will call the spaces we worked in… “home”. Future home-owners with futures restored, and it was our footsteps over this last week that contributed to the journeys of generations that will continue to flock to and make up the fiber of a renewed New Orleans.

In William Shakespeare’s 30th sonnet (which I’ve included below), he speaks of sessions of sweet, silent thought. Here in New Orleans, in the midst of saws whirring and generators generating and train whistles too assertively making their presence known, and people laughing and laughing… there have also been many silent moments for personal inventories and reflection.

Whatever our own personal storms and turbulence have churned up in our lives, bearing witness to the devastation to this city and its homes and lives … disrupted beyond comprehension – all possessions and family vanquished… life slates once stained by the risen waters and its debris are now rinsed to reveal clean slates where life starts anew…. “Only when we lose our life do we truly find it….”


Shakespeare’s 30th sonnet:

WHEN to the sessions of sweet silent thought
I summon up remembrance of things past,
I sigh the lack of many a thing I sought,
And with old woes new wail my dear times’ waste:
Then can I drown an eye, unus’d to flow,
For precious friends hid in death’s dateless night,
And weep afresh love’s long since cancell’d woe,
And moan the expense of many a vanish’d sight:
Then can I grieve at grievances foregone,
And heavily from woe to woe tell o’er
The sad account of fore-bemoaned moan,
Which I new pay as if not paid before.
But if the while I think on thee, dear friend,
All losses are restor’d and sorrows end.

Much was lost here in New Orleans; but there is a whole lot of discovery here now for all who are attracted to live here and for those fortunate enough to contribute in these small, exuberant bursts of week-long work trips; labors of love.

Safe travels pilgrims and Thank you!