How do you keep on keeping on?

Today three people were shot at a second-line parade meant to welcome home people to the city.

This is the New Orleans that was. How can it still be the New Orleans that IS?

After 9/11, I truly, passionately believed that we would be a better generation, a better country, a better people. And, to be honest, we're worse. Much worse.

I believed that post-Katrina, we would be a better city. Rich, poor, black, white-- we suffered the same. We all suffered. How could it be that hearts were not turned? How could it be that souls were not saved? It's heartbreaking.

Can we truly expect that the powers-that-be will look upon our city with hope and with kindness after this? How do we go forth pleading for our survival when this is what our survival has wrought?

I ache for the New Orleans that was, and for the New Orleans that should be.

Yesterday, I spent hours with Hal talking about how important it was that the powers-that-be look kindly upon his neighborhood, a neighborhood that, according to the most recent maps, will be a park unless he and his neighbors can rally enough support in the next four months to save it. We are all in battle with the politicos to save New Orleans... and today's events have set us all back... can we reclaim our stand? Our moral and ethical standing?

This may be the New Orleans that I know... the city that drives people away (including Jas) by the masses... I will keep the faith, y'all. This doesn't have to be who we are or where we are.

Three days ago, I came home from work at 4pm. In the distance, I heard the sound of Xavier Prep's marching band practicing. It was, no joke, the most beautiful sound I've ever heard. It was the sound of return, rebirth, rejoicing. It was the promise of Mardi Gras to come. The sound of teenagers returned. The sound of New Orleans in all it's creaky trumpet glory. Hope. Joy. The sound of long-absent students who have come back to this city to laud the return of the rest of the city. Bliss, man. I welled up with tears and shook my little booty on my front porch until I could hear them no more.

THIS IS HOW WE KEEP ON KEEPING ON, folks! And I will...