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NOTES FROM NEW ORLEANS: The Welcome Arrival of Zoloft and the National Guard
*Thank Gawd! The National Guard has returned. Mayor Nagin is finally coming out of his paralysis and taking action on what we’ve been screaming at him for months now – THE CRIME IS KILLING US! Oh happy day! I’m now finally feeling like I can pull my head up and believe in the sun again.
Daily life here in New Orleans has been completely demoralizing. Words can’t begin to paint the picture of what is happening to our precious, crumbling city. My ‘Hit Rock Bottom’ list of problems, in no particular order, includes:
§ The re-election of an incompetent mayor for no other reason than he’s Black
§ The official beginning of Hurricane Season stimulating our collective trauma memories
§ The incomplete levee protection system
§ The unending retrieval of dead bodies 10 months after the fact
§ Our city water pipe system is crumbling underground, creating a low water pressure which makes it harder to put out…
§ The fires that are breaking out all around us, burning down historic homes, buildings, and our beloved mom and pop local businesses
§ Our gas company Entergy went bankrupt and now they’re shafting residents with bills three times the amount they were last year to cover their losses
§ And, to borrow a phrase from our City Council Potentate Oliver Thomas, we’re now being assaulted by another monster hurricane: “Hurricane Crime”.
Marauding looters are scouring our vacated neighborhoods and stripping homes of their New Orleans-style shutters, gates, vents, lanterns, along with rebuilding materials, appliances and furniture newly bought by homeowners trying to put their lives back together again. And with 36 murders in the 12 weeks, we’re on the fast track to reclaiming our title as Murder Capitol, USA.
The above-cited list, heaped on top of our FEMA/Insurance/MIA evacuees woes hit a final tipping point around the first of June, spreading a fog of depression throughout the hot swamp town, creating an atmosphere nothing short of ghastly.
I recently escaped New Orleans to Los Angeles, completely stressed, broke down, flying on one wing like ‘Sister’ in the 70’s movie ‘Sparkle’. In L.A., I got check-ups from real live doctors – rare, sacred birds back in New Orleans, ate food that wasn’t fried and covered in gravy, and – came face to face with the realization that if I’m to survive this hurricane season-Nagin-recovery era, I need to get myself medicated.
Antidepressants
Yep. Just started em. I’m not sharing this with you to be that edgy, tell-all, pop-grit writer. Quite honestly, it’s the only way I can continue to write anything without bawling my eyes out non-stop and potentially losing our new little budding friendship. Cause if you were watching what’s really going on here through my sad and weary eyes, you might be inclined to delete ‘Notes From New Orleans’ from your inbox.
And then I’d have to stalk you.
I’ve listened to friends and family members in the past tell me about their decision to take anti-depressants. I studied their reasons objectively like an 19th century British physician, cleaning my monocle with a handkerchief, offering a text book analysis of their multitude of problems – naively removed from it all. I personally never had a need for the stuff. Mind over matter, I said to myself. When times got tough, I had plenty of resources to choose from: church, synagogue, sage wands, French brie, chocolate truffles, and Pinotage. And if it really gets bad, I know how to reach back and get the ex-boyfriends on the red phone. Booty calls have excellent medicinal properties that, in my opinion, have been woefully overlooked by the mental health industry.
But now I’m faced with my own long-term, complicated, heart-break that hasn’t gotten any easier after all this time. City-wide collective post traumatic stress, compounded daily by fresh new crisis, amortized over ten months and into the unforeseen future adds up to more weight on my heart than I am capable of carrying. And since I’m heard-headed like the rest of these New Orleanians and am just not gonna give up and move out, I figure keeping my sanity is worth more to me than concerns over social stigmas.
Besides, everyone knows we’re all crazy here anyway.
My doctor is Jewish, the old school kind that’s real practical so when you tell him you just moved to New Orleans, he says, ‘Whadayou, Nuts?!’ People are moving AWAY from there?! No wonder you need antidepressants!” He yanks my nose.
I really wanted a cool sounding drug, one that sounded maybe like hayfever medicine like ‘Celexa’ or ‘Effexor’. I ended up with Zoloft. Sounds like ‘zombie’, ‘lobotomy’, or the name of some evil warlock. But what the hell… Once I wrapped my head around the idea that I’m taking this route, I jumped both feet in. If Zoloft is what it is then dammit, gimme a year’s supply – at the very least.
Just days before it was time for me to return home, I got the good news that troops coming back to help us fight the war for New Orleans. It took a five-at-once murder hit last week to pry Mayor Nagin and Police Superintendent Riley from their formal position that crime is not on the rise and put a call out for the troops to return. Personally, I’m thrilled to have the National Guard back. It means the looting will finally be stamped out. It means we can focus again on just being poor trying to fix tore back houses rather than being poor trying to fix tore back houses that are being attacked by vultures. It means we might have a chance at putting our crumbled lives back together with some peace and dignity, against the comforting, nurturing sounds of rolling Humvees.
Now, armed with the guards and meds, I’m ready to take on the Big Bad Dis-Easy once again.
Enough with the salads! Bring me some fried green tomatoes with crawfish gravy!
Deborah Cotton is a freelance journalist and public speaker based in New Orleans, covering on-the-ground stories of the city’s recovery and chronicling the rebuilding efforts of the historic Ninth Ward. She can be reached at Deborah.cotton@gmail.com.
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