KATRINA RELIEF

Our dinner tonight was cooked by a New Orleans native who had volunteers work on her home last summer and was showing her appreciation by making a huge pot of gumbo for the forty five volunteers now living at First Unitarian Universalist Church for the week. Later on we went to the French Quarter for beignets and walked by the Mississippi River. This was another great evening after another day of hard work. My crew of seven worked for the third day at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Smith; we have now finished the scraping, priming and painting of five rooms plus bathroom and closets. This morning Mr. Smith was waiting for us as we drove up and quickly unlocked the door. He and his wife are both in their early seventies. He is retired but Mrs. Smith works from three to eleven PM at the New Orleans' casino. She leaves at one so she can get the bus and have lunch at a fast food restaurant before work. Our UUCA group of thirteen is living with thirty college students; sharing the kitchen and bathrooms is working out better than expected. We sleep in one room with seven bunk beds. Every day on our way to work we are reminded of the devastation; houses still not fit to live in , some being worked on and others waiting for their owners to receive money to begin the long job ahead. Ten thirty and time for lights out.