Sports Commentary September 5, 2005

B & G Imagination Junction



Again A Reminder Of What Is Real ……………………..


Monday is the American holiday of Labor Day.

Labor Day and the first week of September represent a number of things from year to year in this country.

For this reporter the thought of the beginning of the school year on Tuesday can never be wiped out from the memory bank—as one, that was never a whiz in the classroom, I dreaded Labor Day for such a forbearing reason.

Though not officially, for all intents, Labor Day marks the end of summer and the beginning of autumn.

The Labor Day weekend, in America, means the annual telethon hosted by comedian Jerry Lewis to raise money to eradicate muscular dystrophy.
In sports, September’s dawn marks the beginning of baseball’s regular season sunset as this final month will decide which clubs get to battle to reach the World Series in October.

Hockey teams begin training camp heading for an October opening—a tradition renewed this year after a one-season hiatus.

Finally, September’s arrival marks the start of both the collegiate and professional football seasons.

This week, in the routine proper order of things, would be this column’s preview of the pigskin madness to come and an opinion offered whether the University of Southern California and the Hew England Patriots would extend its dynasties another campaign.

So, yes, in the proper order of things the birth of September is many things but though all of the above are happening once more the pigskin preview shall be placed on hold because-in 2005-the proper order has been cruelly broken.

School days, ball games, telethons, changing seasons and football seem not to matter as-once more-the stark darkness of reality has blown away the fantasies and romanticism of our ideals.

On Monday a devastating hurricane-named Katrina-roared through the Gulf of Mexico then battered the coastline of Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana with winds up to one-hundred forty five miles per hour.

Even for a region well used to enduring hurricanes Katrina was too much to bear—New Orleans, the largest city in the affected area, was virtually destroyed.

With literally thousands of lives feared lost, from the flooding, Katrina is already thought the single worst natural disaster in American history.

We have been down this road before and it was not all that long ago. Earlier this year the tsunami ate up a number of national shorelines in the South Pacific and Indian Oceans. We wept for the terrible devastation of mainly poor underdeveloped countries but smugly thought, “But this can’t happen to us.”

Well, Mother Nature is the most democratic of all forces as she cares not how high or low you sit on the society’s totem pole. A lack of advance warning was blamed for the high death toll of the tsunami yet a high death toll is mounting along the Gulf coast among victims that knew of the coming of Katrina a week or more before arrival.

Many did evacuate the area in time—there are the stories of ten people in a hotel room in Houston and a shelter set up at the massive Louisiana Superdome.

Yet, for those able to escape, there will be the return to homes and towns destroyed. Those, in the mighty New Orleans sports stadium, are now at the Houston Astrodome as Katrina blew off a portion of the Superdome’s roof making one of the biggest buildings in the world unsafe for habitation.

Those were the lucky folks.

All the rest were either too stubborn or just not able to run. The result is people perishing in floods or desperately seeking rescue from rooftops.

Technically, New Orleans has always been under water as it is considered ten feet below sea level with the dangerous Gulf and the mouth of the Mississippi River. Just a few years ago came dire predictions that within fifty years the city of New Orleans would sink—the future arrived early.

Two other cities, east of New Orleans, Mobile and Biloxi are very hard hit as well but ancient and inadequate levees-around New Orleans-made the damage there the worst.

It cannot happen in America but it did.

Of course it did not happen in all of America and not in the most heavily concentrated areas, of the East Coast, so while we all weep life is proceeding unlike the days after September of 2001.

Americans and the world were swift to help the affected areas of the tsunami and now are being generous with the recovery after Katrina.

I have been through flooding, a major hurricane and for a short while resided near New Orleans so know some of the pain felt there right now.
I never, though, had my home destroyed or clung to a rooftop awaiting a helicopter to pull me to safety. I was never close to being struck by a falling tree or flying debris. I was never in fear of drowning in my own house. So, I do not really know what is going on in the Bayou and in Dixie.

More than likely none of you have been through such horrors either so maybe this explains why we are so wanting to assist but cannot halt our lives, for a few days, as we somehow did in 2001.
I am not one to always yell, “Stop the world I want to get off” but sometimes we need to if only for a short time.

I promise that I will not get political but, at this moment, war seems very trivial. There is a new war and it is on our soil and seemingly more important. Katrina was the terrorist but now the enemies, in New Orleans, are the looters and rioters of the streets that have taken over the abandoned city.

The situation is so severe that the mayor and governor are saying that priority needs to be given to rescue efforts and not stopping the violence.

Even the mighty are so vulnerable—this is not a third world nation but America and though just a relatively small portion of America it should make us all feel some of what we felt four years ago--two completely different situations? Yes and not really.

The affected region will rebuild but it will take years as no town or home can be rebuilt in a day.

There is a spirit in New Orleans perhaps unlike anywhere else in America—that spirit will not be lost. Southern Mississippi and Alabama have rebuilt so often they know the drill.
The rest of America and the world do care and will help—even my relatively small city of Yuma have rescue personnel on call to head for the area if needed. Marines just returned, to our local base, that were in Iraq are being deployed to New Orleans.

My questions are what can we learn from the tragedy that is Hurricane Katrina and what can the answers do for us in the future?

We all became somewhat introspective four years ago and then earlier this year so, maybe, it is time to go to that mirror again and take stock.

I will not trivialize the full spectrum of life and can understand our lives not being completely put on hold this week. Yet, after we give thanks that this time it was not we, are we as caring for those that did not luck out?

Let us hope that the survivors can return to some semblance of the normalcy that we enjoy as soon as possible.

For them let us hope that the day comes soon that telethons, Major League Baseball, college football and the National Football League can be of interest to them.

This past week they had enough reality.

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