No Sane Choice

Believe it or not, I am going to look at a couple of houses in New Orleans this afternoon. Are we crazy? Last week I was so far away from even considering staying that I can’t believe we are starting to talk about it now. The fact that we are is prime evidence of the roller coaster of emotions that I think is typical of Katrina survivors. We tend to fluctuate wildly from one week to the next (or day even) as we try to make reasoned decisions about the direction of our lives. But the choices, if rationally considered, are not particularly appealing. No one course of action stands up and says “Hey, this is the sanest thing to do!” Instead, any decision we make will feel crazy. And so the emotional turmoil takes over. There is just no way to approach all of this rationally.

We would love to move back to the smallish Midwestern city we lived in before coming down here, but we’re not sure how to manage it. The main stumbling block is our jobs. If my husband was able to get a job with his former employer (and that’s still a big if) and we did make the move, we would immediately lose 50% of our income. And I’m not sure how I would be able to start earning again. What are my options, even? Freelance writing is certainly appealing but also so unpredictable. Adjunct teaching is so poorly paid and subject to semester-by-semester renewal. And then there’s the demoralizing lack of respect accorded adjuncts at most schools, even though most of them are recent Ph.D.’s struggling to find (and certainly qualified for) tenure-track positions. It’s a demoralizing position to be in.

So is feeling like you are not in control of your life. My husband and I have decent jobs, but they are in a city we don’t feel safe in (never have--but now, forget about it). And now we feel stuck. I’ve put myself out there repeatedly over the years and been shot down. My husband knows from co-workers’ experiences that the job market in journalism isn’t much rosier.

So maybe, we are starting to think, we should try to find a “high-and-dry” house in New Orleans and stop this awful state of limbo we are in. We also don’t know how much longer we can take living in our 700-suqare-foot, refrigerator-odor-infested apartment suitable more for college students than a family. But even our prospects here, financially speaking, don’t look so good. It is becoming clear from our own online hunting and a recent house search of some friends of ours that a decent 3-bedroom home in Uptown that didn’t receive any water will cost you about a half million dollars. Prices per square foot have gone up 75% in Uptown since Katrina. What’s a middle-class couple with a small child to do?

The houses I’m looking at today are in the Irish Channel (south of Magazine Street). It was a neighborhood in flux before the storm, and now, who knows? Probably the best move is just to wait and see how things will shake out for New Orleans. Maybe sellers will come to their senses and lower their asking prices. Maybe Bush and the Congress will come through with Category 5 levee protection and coastal restoration. Maybe the city will get behind the Bring New Orleans Back Commission’s plan for rebuilding the city and real progress will begin. Maybe middle-income people who were flooded out will be able to afford new homes and will be able to stay. Maybe the schools will finally become places of learning instead of fear and ignorance. Maybe there will be a place for us here. Or maybe there won’t. But how long will we have to wait to find that out?