Starting Places
Five years ago, Judge Ed Emmett rang me up as I was juggling two phones trying to get information about which of our centers were flooded and which were dry. As then CEO of BakerRipley I was thinking past the immediate emergency of drastic flooding and stranded people, trying to inventory what assets we had […]
The Sweat of Terror
Australia Ten years ago I was in Australia, near Melbourne, with people who had lived through a nightmare. The Kinglake fire is still often referred to as Australia’s worst natural disaster. The Black Saturday bushfires killed 173 people, 120 in the Kinglake area alone. Another 414 people were injured. More than 450,000 hectares burned and 3500 […]
Commandments of Help
How to help in disasters Trust is everything. You can move at the speed of trust. Perform within the container of trust. You will go as far as trust can stretch. Improvisation is critical if you want to be effective. If you lack the courage – or the cover – to break useless rules – […]
Limbo Limbo Limbo
slow and low I share about patterns. Here’s the pattern we’re in with respect to recovery (if we can call it that). More about the troublesome nature of that word – recovery – next time. A lot of us are whispering “I’m so tired.” And we aren’t the “get a good nights sleep and all […]
2016
2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 One of our early Houston founding families supported the creation of settlement houses and community centers, because, as he said, “neighbors should live as friends”. I just recently returned from Germany. A country leading the struggle to welcome newcomers, to make a place for over a million Syrian refugees. German […]
Upheaval
Yesterday I wrapped up another class about disaster and displacement. Lessons learned by those whose lives have been washed/bombed/burned away. One of the deepest realities: we’re all vulnerable creatures on a common journey. Upheaval is a part of the journey. War or weather. Loss of health or wealth. This ain’t heaven. It’s earth. We’re all […]
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 […]
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 […]
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 […]
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 […]