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    A leader is anyone willing to step forward and help.

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Archives of Disasters

UPHEAVAL

(We’re sick of this damn virus) In the aftermath of disaster there are discernible patterns — stages of thought, behavior and emotions. Fifteen ago I began to map them. To document — from the experiences of people who’d faced the unthinkable — those patterns and stages. You can read some of what I’ve written about them on my website. This is […]
9 months ago

My appeal to Mayor Sylvester Turner and Judge Lina Hidalgo

Dear Mayor Sylvester Turner and Judge Lina Hidalgo: Let me be frank. If you step up and lead — call upon sector leaders to join you in navigating this unthinkable twin disaster — you will win the resources and support needed to have a more effective and orderly recovery. If you don’t do this, you will find […]
11 months ago

Louisiana On My Mind —

I am thinking of some of my most treasured relationships. People in Louisiana. Friends and family. Many Louisiana friends are “storm friends”. We came to know one another in the aftermath of Katrina. We’ve seen horrible stuff. We’ve hugged in a street surrounded by wreckage, when everything was gray dust covered, with the smell of […]
11 months ago

7 Stages of Disaster Recovery: How the Light Gets In

“There is a crack in everything. It’s how the light gets in.” -Leonard Cohen About twelve years ago I began collecting stories — stories that emerged from working with people who had survived disasters. There were so many lessons in these stories. After a time, I began to notice that the wisdom I heard and […]
11 months ago

The Oath Takers

Some of us are in professions that require the taking of an oath. We ask it of doctors, of soldiers, of public servants. Of those we elect to represent us. Of people we entrust with power. Our doctors swear to ”respect the hard-won scientific gains of those physicians in whose steps I walk… and apply […]
11 months ago

ENOUGH TODAY

I slept badly and woke up with a sense of dread. A few moments during which I knew something was wrong but I didn’t know what. And then I remembered. #COVID-19 I am filled with dread because we have been told that it will get much worse before it gets better. Much much worse. Italian […]
11 months ago

FERAL HOGS: In Disasters

Anti-fragility We woke up today to a story about the people we elected using their knowledge of what was coming — a potential pandemic — to enrich themselves. In every disaster there is the “betrayal stage”. That’s the moment when the realization comes that some part of this suffering could have been avoided. And that […]
11 months ago

SAVING GRACE

Loving Detachment When I desperately wanted to save my family from the ravages of the disease of alcoholism, I would have gone to any lengths to force solutions, would have said anything, done anything. And I tried in all the ways I knew how, to adjust, to shape shift, to mitigate what was happening in […]
1 year ago

RED LINE

I’m more interested in armor than vulnerability. In war, we don’t expose our throat to the enemy. When we are being assaulted, our poetic professions of pain do not cause a perpetrator to pause in their cruelty. We continue to believe all the displays of outrage and empathy, calls to higher ground and virtue are […]
1 year ago

Born For Storms: Nine Lessons on Creating Welcome and the Journey to Recovery

One of the oldest stories in the world is the story of displacement. Upended lives. Mass migrations. Wholesale disruptions of community and belonging. When weather or war make our world uninhabitable, we will move to higher ground. We will seek a new life. I have witnessed this recovery journey as CEO of BakerRipley, the largest […]
1 year ago
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