The Pre-Pearlington Struggle

and its outcome

31 March 2006

Before leaving for Pearlington, there was a battle waging inside. This struggle revolved around my youngest child, Giovanna. She is 6 years old and has some physical limitations. Giovanna tires easily and can be difficult at times. As I thought about the week, I couldn’t think of a job that she could do. The bottom line was that I didn’t want to be distracted by her. I didn't want to spend the week watching her, I could stay in Minnesota and do that. It was hard to think about going down to Mississippi and not do what I felt He was calling me to do. It didn't even dawn on me that God might have a plan for her down there. Once there, I was not distracted by her, not did I just "baby sit" her.

God had a plan in mind for this little girl and it was not one that I could have planned or prepared for. I stood in awe as I watched how God use this little spitfire all through the week. God did heart surgery once again and made me realize that my vision is so limited.

Once Giovanna’s feet hit the dirt in Pearlington, she did what she does best – walks into a room with her smile that lights up a room and instantly becomes everyone’s friend. By the end of the week, she knew almost everyone in the Pearlington Hilton complex. Some here in Minneapolis have experienced the following: Giovanna sees someone she knows and likes, says “Mom, Look.” Then she takes off running, grabs the person’s leg and gives them a big bear hug. She did this in Pearlington to a lot of people from the community. Towards the end of the week she stopped yelling, “Mom look” and just ran. Many in Pearlington could not help it when they saw her – they just burst into a big smile – it was infectious.

There were small tasks for her to be a part of. For instance on Monday the kids and Gary went to a place and picked up shingles. Mr. Randall had a magnet with a rope on it. Giovanna pulled that magnet around for over 2 hours picking up shingle nails. She would walk around the building once, meet Mr. Randall who would clean off all the nails she picked up, hand the magnet back to her to start again. She was really tired at the end of her day

There were many High School kids there on spring break working. All of them knew her by name and really looked out for her. Some were reminded of little sisters that they had back home. One of the leaders of the group from Chicago came up to her and said, “You are a cutie.” Giovanna’s response, “No, Gigi.”

She was the ray of sunshine in a community that needed a fresh look at life.

At the end of the week when I was telling some of those in the community that I had struggled with bringing her down, their reactions were priceless. Larry Randall said, “I am so glad you brought her. She has brightened everyone’s life.” Another one of the regular volunteers said, “It was good for her to be here. She needs to remind us that kids play a vital role in our recovery.”

I was humbled and in tears. Jesus said, “Let the children come to me.” He used her in a way that I would never have imagined. Children play a vital role in this community's recovery.

Everyone wants to see her again.

The Faces of Pearlington

30 March 2006

There are many people that God brought into our lives while in Pearlington. There are many stories that we heard while there. God has been doing some amazing things. Pastor Rawls talks about the ministry of “walking alongside us as we rebuild our lives.” There is something to be said for just being with people. We did a lot of walking alongside – some of which was just being available to be called on for whatever task needed to be attended to.

Here are some of the people and their stories:

Ben and Sue Taylor – This was the family that we read about before we left. They had to reconstruct their house. They were blessed as they could use the existing foundation and studs. They have made great progress, but they have also had some setbacks. Their oldest daughter was in a car accident in February and was not expected to be walking until summer. She is now walking on her own. Her mother says that it is due to all the prayers from Mississippi all the way up to Canada. We went down to help work on their house. They had made much progress and didn’t have a lot of work for us. We did get their floor ready for the new flooring.

On Wednesday, they made supper for us. We sat in their house and just as we began to eat, Ben made the following statement, “This is the first time we have been in our house since Katrina with friends and having a conversation.” Sue agreed and added, “It is one of the few times we have been together as a family and not talking about the house and what work needs to be done on it.” What a blessing to be the first to break bread together with them in their house.

As we continued to talk with them, I made the comment that we did not do much. Before the words were barely off my lips, Ben said, “Don’t ever think that anything you do down here is insignificant. The work that you did has brought us one step closer to being in our house.”

Pastor Rawls and his church family – Pastor Rawls church was damaged in the hurricane. There is a group out of Florida that has committed to help rebuild the churches and the fellowship hall of this church is completed. This is where his church meets on Wednesday nights and Sunday mornings. His church family feeds the volunteers hot lunches almost every day – sometimes they feed over 300. Pastor Rawls always greets the volunteers and thanks them for their efforts. He is very upbeat and appreciative of all the efforts of the volunteers. We are on the other hand appreciated the meals that his church prepares for us daily. Some of his church members are still rebuilding their homes, yet they take time out of their day to feed us. That is the heart of a servant.

Larry Randall and Herb Ritchie – Larry reminds me of the typical cowboy – blue jeans and cowboy boots. Herb has his long white hair pulled back into a ponytail and looks very distinguished. These men are from the community and are committed to seeing that Pearlington is rebuilt. They are both at the recovery center from 7 AM until at least 10 PM. These men lost their homes in the hurricane. They are in the process of rebuilding and both live on limited incomes. They work on their homes after they complete their work at the recovery center. They have had some of the teams come and do the bigger projects. Larry needs crown molding and base molding for his house. Herb needs to buy paint. There are currently some volunteers that are willing to work on Larry’s house, if he had the supplies – but he doesn’t have time or the money to get it. There is another team coming in this next week to paint Herb’s house, but he is in the same boat. My church sent down some money with us to help those in need. We took Larry to Lowe’s and told him to pick out his crown and base molding. He was shocked and amazed and as we told him what we were going to do, his eyes began to glisten. His wife was in tears. Herb wasn’t able to make the trip with us to buy paint, but we left a gift card for him to buy the paint for his house. I heard later that both men shed some tears over this act of kindness. I have asked both of these to send me pictures when they are done.

Doug Pennington – is from Florida and his church has committed to Pearlington for the long haul. Doug is currently overseeing the reconstruction of the 4 African Amercian churches that were in town before the hurricane hit - all of which are rebuilding. His story is amazing. He retired early and had played all of the golf he wanted to play. He was watching TV after one of the hurricanes hit Florida a few years ago and told God that he would go and do whatever He wanted him to do. Three days later he got a call from someone at his church and has been in the disaster relief business every since. His vision for this community is larger than to just rebuild the church buildings. He has a vision for racial reconciliation. After completing the rebuilding of the churches, he wants to continue working in town to provide counseling and healing. He has seen much healing since the hurricane – hurricanes don’t discriminate. They are equal destruction destroyers! The community is beginning to come together and help one another. He is praying for a revival in this town. Let’s join with him in praying for revival and reconciliation.

Mary Lena became one of the people I got to know the best. She is a fun loving woman who has been working in disaster kitchens for many years. She has been to Pearlington several times and has been called in to help design their permanent kitchen. Currently the kitchen will be housed in an army tent until a more permanent facility can be constructed. We have a lot in common and she referred to me as her sister that was born into a different family. We had a lot of fun and thanks to funds from the BBC hurricane fund; I was able to buy some of the items for the kitchen. Every time we went to buy something, she would dance and say, “God is so good. He just keeps on moving in people’s hearts to bring this kitchen to life.” She was one of the hardest people to leave. She taught me a lot and even gave me the opportunity to cook for 150 people! Before we left, she pulled me to one side and prayed for the kids, my husband and myself. Both of us were in tears before the prayer was done.

The Ministry of Walking Alongside Others

30 March 2006

Upon our arrival in Pearlington, we found out that the Taylor family, the ones we had come to help, had a death in the family. The funeral was Monday morning. We started the day by getting the address of John and Nan Givens and drove out to see if they needed help. John is pushing 80 and has been a carpenter all his life. He had been trying to do all the work himself, but he had come to realize that he couldn’t. He had help getting his roof done and once he saw Giovanna, he didn’t think he would have any work for us.

We then headed back to the Pearl*Mart and found different jobs to carry us through the morning. We sorted through a shipment of food and put it in the warehouse; we also helped sort out the donated clothes. After lunch there was a job of cleaning up debris by one of the lodges. Gary took the kids and went to the lodge. They spent the afternoon picking up the old shingles around the building while Giovanna picked up shingle nails with a big magnet tied to a pull rope. Corrie stayed at the Pearl*Mart and helped get the boxes ready for delivery to the elderly. Some of the girls from Culver came and helped.

Tuesday and Wednesday were spent at the Taylor house scraping the old glue off the concrete floor in order to get it ready for the new flooring. This was a slow job but we got most of the hallway done and a good portion of the living room and kitchen area. After 2 days, the Taylors said that we had done enough and told us that we could move on to other places where there was work that needed to be done. This attitude of the Pearlington residents is prevalent there. Helping others is more important. Everyone wants the community back and is willing to sacrifice work on their place so that others in need can get help. This is amazing, since almost every home in the town was damaged to some degree.

The job that the kids enjoyed the most and as Charlie Holmes put it, “The job that would mean the most to us at this point in time,” was getting the floor done in the “New” Army tent that went up while we were there. The kids had to take the nails out of the plywood sheets that had been nailed to pallets and take them to the tent and then move the pallets. Thanks to the Americorp volunteers, they moved some of the pallets with a tractor. Once the kids got enough pallets and put them in place, they got to put the plywood boards back in place, nail them down for the floor, and added some other measured and cut scrap wood pieces to even things out. This eventually became the floor of Pearl's Cafe.

The people of Pearlington amaze me. I am a runner and currently training for a marathon. I am week 8 of 18 weeks of training. I have 18 weeks of hard training, and 4 to 4 ½ hours of running the marathon and I am done. The people of Pearlington have been in this race for 7 plus months and it is estimated that it will take 3-5 years to rebuild the town. I spent a week living in a room in the school, using porta-a-potty and a shower that were outside of the school. Some of the Pearlington residents are still in tents. Training for a marathon is peanuts compared to what they face over the next few years.

I have been asked many times if I am glad to be back. I must say that I am struggling with that at the moment. I would have loved to stay another week or two. I once asked a missionary how he could continue going back to a place that is really hard. His response was and is priceless – there is no better place to be than where God has placed your heart. My heart is still in Pearlington.

Welcome to Pearlington

27 March 2006

We arrived in Pearlington on Sunday after dark. Even under the canopy of the darkness, we could still see the downed trees. It was an eerie picture, but the cover of darkness hid a lot of the devastation. Finding the Pearl*Mart was easy – the gymnasium of the elementary school. Ben and Sue Taylor were waiting for us. We talked for several minutes and then Laurie showed us to the Pearlington Hilton – which was the room where the library had been housed before Katrina.

Our room was large and housed between 50-60 people, mostly high school students on spring break. There were rows of cots for all of us to sleep on and in the middle of one wall was the “changing room” complete with shower curtain door and tarp walls. There was a nice white picket fence on the inside. It was very nice after spending parts of the past 3 days in a car. There was also a nice large soccer field in front, aka parking lot, which was used nightly by the kids. There were exactly 9 beds easily accessible and divided nicely – 3 in one area for the girls and 6 in another for the boys. God is indeed good.

The bathroom and shower were not far away. Both could be walked too within several seconds. The Bathroom was a nice blue color – you have seen them in other locations and you generally call them Port-a-Pottys! The shower was a FEMA trailer divided in half – one side for the men and the other for the women. Each contained 3 showers – with hot water!!! We had all of the comforts of home.

As we began to settle in, we were inundated with the high school students from Indiana and Chicago. They were loud and Giovanna did not like them at first. There was a group from Culver Indiana – a boarding school for 9th-12th grade and about 15 of their students came, along with 4 chaperones. The other group from Chicago numbered about 30.

The most challenging aspect of this set up was to determine the time for lights out. The Ayers/Schmitter kids were used to lights out around 9 – the high schoolers much later. Most nights we were able to compromise and get the lights out by 10:15.

The wake up call came every morning at 7:15 sharp. John Lyle from Culver undertook this task. He was always very chipper and happy to do this jobJ. The Pearlington Hilton has a nice continental breakfast served on the patio out front. The kids were never late for breakfast, especially Giovanna.

As one walks the grounds of the Pearlington Hilton Complex, you come to the ball field. The once green field that I sure was always filled with the sounds of children playing is now hard packed dirt with the sounds of construction. The Seabees are building sleeping barracks. When we left at the end of the week, 5 of the 6 had the construction completed and several were being painted. One or two were actually housing people already. There are tents at one end housing some long-term volunteers like the Americore folks. The Cooperative Baptist Fellowship also has a tent at one end. I would much rather see this ball field filled with children playing.

Monday morning we drove through the town. While much has been accomplished in the 7 months since the hurricane, there is still much to get done. Some homes are almost done; some are in various stages of reconstruction. There are some lots that have been bulldozed and setting empty and others look like they have not been touched in 7 months.

The post office is 2 rows of mailboxes that set outside. The building structure is gone.

All that is left of the bank is the ATM.

All that is left of the grocery store:

There is work being done this week on 3 of the 4 black churches in the community. The little white and blue church of Pastor Rawls has their fellowship hall complete and they feed up to 300 volunteers a hot lunch – daily!!! There are 4 other churches in the area – the Catholic Church will not be rebuilt. The Methodist church’s future is uncertain. The Baptist church is doing some reconstruction and I forget what the other church is doing.

The Community before Katrina was about 2,500. Only about 1700 have returned. The future of the other 7-800 people is uncertain. Of the 120 plus kids that were attending the elementary school last year, only 60 plus are enrolled from Pearlington this year and are attending a school in Kiln. The school days are long for these kids. They board a bus at 6:20 AM and return to Pearlington around 3 in the afternoon.

Spring has definitely arrived in Pearlington. The trees (what is left of them) are leafing out, the grass is green and it is a welcome sight to eyes of one who left Minnesota with snow on the ground and where the snow was gone, the pre brown drab of grass trying to decide if it will green up when the sun hits sometime. God was good in the weather department – it was pleasant and warm. We could wear shorts and short-sleeved shirts, that is until later in the day when the gnats came out. Then long sleeves were recommended to avoid getting lots of bites.

All in all this is a nice town. The people are friendly and upbeat. There is lots of work to be done and we are ready to dig in.