This morning Melodie, Jody, Stacey and Sara cooked breakfast and then shopped and set up meals for the groups and staff workers who will take their turns in the kitchen the rest of the week. The rest of us went to the house site (in East Biloxi, not far from David and Patricia’s house and not far from Bill Johnson’s home, either) and got to work promptly. Peter, the leader from Habitat of Northern Virginia, gathered us and let us know what we would be doing. He spent much of the day there helping everyone get started and answering questions. We will not be able to meet the owner of the house (who is out of state now) and I will miss that. However, it is much easier to get started this way (last year, one day of the five was spent picking a site, gathering tools [across town]..) Everyone worked very hard in the heat. Lunch was served at a Salvation Army Center at Biloxi 'Yankee Stadium,' a football stadium near the work site. One picture above shows Scott G. visiting with a young woman named Emmy, Biloxi native, who told us about the storm and the days after, the time in shelters with her three children, and many other things.
I went to see Bill in the afternoon, and he is doing ok and working (there are more fish carvings/paintings on the wall of his studio) . It is always good to see him. He will not have to move anytime soon, and there is a strong possibility that he will be able to rent a house not far away from his present home once that house is refurbished. Some of us will go sometime this week to Bill’s place to help him to move and pack some things.
I saw Sam and Evelyn Reyer tonight, and we sat and visited. There are big changes at Bethel coming up- Pastor Jerry and Judy will retire at the end of this month and move to their lake place in Georgia. There will be an interim pastor coming in September. Sam and Evelyn are well and send their very warmest greetings to everyone at Cross and Crown.
We heard from Donna Tasker, a Bethel staff member, tonight as she presented the ‘Eyes of Hope’ DVD and gave background information. The song play aside pictures from September 05. I’ve been thinking again and again that having been here before does not make me any smarter about any of this - in fact, it gets harder each time. I have seen and heard, and heard from people I know here (I am blessed to be able to check in with people I met in Oct 05) that when the storms happened everyone – rich, poor, in between, had the storm in common- everyone had a story, and people who had never had to ask for help with basics in their lives were suddenly vulnerable. Each time I’ve come (one year later, six months and then four months after that ) I see and hear more and more that people who have experienced recovery (job, prospects, house, future) were less and less inclined to remember that they once were vulnerable. Each time I come here, the changes, the amount of rebuilding of businesses and homes is extraordinary to me. But each time I come here, people who are struggling here seem less and less visible to the people around them. I don’t believe any of us want to remember when we’ve been through terrible times, and we want to get to some kind of normal. When I’m here, ‘normal’ doesn’t seem so great. There were many amazing healings and connections happening back in the most terrible time. That was then, and we get to be here now, not just out in the community but here at Bethel in their time of big changes. What are we being called to do? Gretchen helped to lead everyone in hand motions for the song ‘love grows.’ What the song says is still true- one person at a time, one armload of sticks, or tiles, or whatever, at a time, one looking people in the eye at a time is how good things happen.
- Pastor Glen