Changed Waters:Thrown Rocks, Building Castles to open Aug1

 “You can do two things when people throw rocks at you. Pick them up and throw them back, or collect those stones and build yourself a castle.” ~Terence Howard

 There will be a number artists exhibiting their work in this exhbition with expressing where they are today or reflecting where they were when boulders was being hurled at them during the storm.  I searched for visual imagery for my own story and decided I need to go back for a moment...

Fortunately my neighbor at that time, musician Ben Schneck of the Panorama Jazz Band was kind enough to return to the house and shot these images in Oct rough about 5 weeks out from the storm

The images I am showing here were from my old place Uptown New Orleans roughly about 5 weeks after Hurricane Katrina & Rita and the levees breaking.  I had a viscereal response.

If anything, it solidifies for me why I must do the "Changed Waters: Thrown Rocks, Building Castles" exhibition that will open Aug1 through Sept 6th,2015.

Fortunately in one way, I am I was not here but actually had just been ask to extend my residency at Bennett College for Women in North Carolina. I was literally two weeks out from the storm preparing to return back to New Orleans.

But for all intent and purposes I was.  More on that later.







You can see the bags caught in the trees outside my bay windows.  Mind you this is two floors above ground.  The murals were done by artist Michele Lambertthat I had commissioned in 2000.


Bay window view




In my dining room




Dining room



Inscribe by the person who rented the house after I moved out






The fire that took out the whole block across the street from me.

Standing in the Shadows Workshops 

 

August 26-November 25, 2014 (each Tuesday) | 6:00-8:00 p.m.

Ashé Cultural Arts Center | 1712 Oretha Castle Haley Blvd., NOLA

Free and open to the public

 

 

http://www.ashecac.org/

 

 

 

"Rara Avis"~JHM©14 In the Colection of Ilene Martinez, singer-songwriter
 

"Standing in the Shadows (No More)" is a series of narrative quilting workshops led by visual poet artist Jacquelyn Hughes Mooney.  These workshops will provide participants with opportunities to incorporate their own compelling personal stories as they create vibrant, jazzy, contemporary, quilted textile collages. During the workshops, an eclectic group of storytellers, poets, speakers, etc. will be engaged as part of the soul experience.

Finished quilts will be formally exhibited at Ashé Cultural Arts Center from March 3-April 30, 2015. "Standing in the Shadows" will then embark on a national & international tour in the fall of 2015 with its 2nd "thread" in Montpellier, France. This is not "just" a quilting class. Those interested do not need any sewing experience. Just by simply being willing to Cover Your HeART so Your Soul will be warmed while discovering millenniums-old tradition done in a contemporary vibe.  Be sure bring a pair of fabric scissors, and if you desire, fabrics you can share at this communal event.

 

"Standing in the Shadows (No More)" quilting workshops start August 26, 2014. Workshop sessions will be held each Tuesday through November 25, 2014. For more information, call Jacquelyn Hughes Mooney at 504-645-6168 or Karel Sloane-Boekbinder at (504) 569-9070.

 

Ashé Cultural Arts Center | 1712 Oretha Castle-Haley Blvd. | New Orleans | LA | 70113

 

 

 

 

Be'Seeching~ Jacquelyn Hughes Mooney© 02 Changed Waters Katrina series.  
 In the Collection of author Tina McElroy Ansa

 

 

 

 

" Reveling"~JHM©13 Circular Thangs series

 

"Reveling3"~JHM©13 Circular Thang series

 

 

 

Do you have a recorded history?

The secret to reaching your goals may rest in the written word. Writing is a common theme through every stage of successful goal achievement. The act of writing creates a promise, and having that visual promise in front of you every day won't let you forget it. Got a problem remembering what goals you met last week? Start tracking them on a daily basis. No more guessing and fooling yourself. The only way to get a really accurate picture of your progress is to record what you've done when you do it. Got something to say or a breakthrough to announce? Write it in a journal. Journals can show you what works and what doesn't. And the stories of your success can be great motivators in the future, right when you need help the most. From pregnancy start to pregnancy finish, you can help your memory and your goals by putting ink to paper. It can make up for fading memory and keep motivation from fading at all

 Jacquelyn Hughes Mooney,artist

Photography by Gus Bennett for the New Orleans People Project ©2014

Amour: Falling in Love at a Farmer's Market

I was inspired but not in the way you think. I walked up to a Saturday Marketplace operated in the Ninth Ward of New Orleans. I did not think they were going to be opened so close to the holidays, but there they were!




The first thing I heard as I came around the corner was the sounds of The Neo Collective trio www.neojazz.net

this was before I saw the produce. Today was a gorgeous almost spring day, great skies right temperature & organic foods.



I purchased pumpkin bread, curried couscous & blackeye peas salad from one vendor. Then 3 types of pepper jelly, chow chow (a Louisiana relish) pickled green tomatoes that were to die for and organic,free range eggs from Mr. Cal Crops from chicken he raises.



And then I headed home but before I got to the corner the first line of a poem popped in my head. The thought startled me as I've not been that terribly inspire to write any poetry this year sans one back a several months ago.



It happened because I watched the bass guitarist who happened to be a woman deeply immersed in creating sounds in her head, lost in her own world of sounds.



The last time I wrote something from my If Jazz was a Color series was a poem called the "Sounds of the Men" in 2000 watch a jazz brunch. In fact I paid a nod to it in this poem.



Amazing what healthy food, good weather and change can do!







Until I Saw That Face

By Jacquelyn Hughes Mooney (c)12



Until I saw that face

I always thought that deep

powerful

engrossing...

mesmerizing can't get enough of that feeling that comes from jazz

was relegated from that place...

that place

that secret society that held the sounds of the men.

It made me fall in love again

for that 100 thousandth time

with the face of New Orleans.

Just when I had enough

Really enough of

that dark side

that black hole

that keeps springing up at the most inopportune tie

From the gut cramping of near shattered souls that can ever seem to come clean

not unlike that blackened mold & stench out of the intestines of Katrina winds.

My patience had worn thin..

I wanted to run until that highway ran out

just to get away from that surreal vibe.

But then...

like the taste of calamondian oranges made into marmalade

the sweetness and the the sour-ness

I saw in that face

I saw in that face

that face...



that face...

And I fell in love all over again

for the zillionth time...

For the very last time

So I say..

With the face of New Orleans

All rights reservedJHM12-21-12(c)

Walk this Way: I am STILL Grinnin'

I am still grinning this morning albeit a wee bit sore as I took advantage of a beautiful  winter day  that seemed more like spring & not January .  An urgent need to get  to the post office necessitated my getting out to walk.  I didn't need a lot of prodding.

Round trip it took me about 45 minutes thereabouts as I was walking a tad bit slow to test out the knees since I knew it was an increase in  how far I've walked previously...

I had not been out in the last month because of the see-saw  inclement weather which gave me plenty of excuses not to go although I did a lot of micro-walks inside my home.  Apparently it worked as apart from some minor soreness which indicated I gave my body a workout without over taxing still had me just a'smilin' this morning.

And I slept very well to boot!

I got to see another side of my neighborhood on streets I had not seen to see the still ongoing construction & re-sparking of homes still in disrepair from Katrina and was happy.  Some homes are far more modest but nonetheless gratifying to see what is happening.

I so wished I had my camera.

I enjoyed the birds chirping the sun beaming and the pure injoyment in the physicality of what I was doing!

And then I saw as I neared my street, first seeing him from a distance, a man who is an amputee very slowly on crutches taking  his walk.  He had as I saw when I came up on him, had his leg amputated to his knee & the other leg was twisted inward.

But there he was walking away, inch by inch, step by step with his crutches. In the time it took me to walk the block, he may have walked 1/4 of a block.  But there he was...

He turned to come back in the direction I was so apparently he lived from where I was coming from and I lived in the direction  he was coming from.  I just grinned and spoke.  He smiled and we kept on our way.

I am going to make it a point to travel that street again in case I see him and perhaps on a good day we can walk together even if it is just a block.  I have no desire to invade his privacy  (and I like my time alone too).  Nor do I need to see him as a special case because he is an amputee, but as one disabled to another, we are telling the world we are "other able".

It was good simply because we both just plugged in, each dealing with our own level of challenged but nonetheless doing what we needed to do.

Today is suppose to be yet another glorious day into the low 60's & I will  walk this way again not knowing who or what I will connect with even if it is just for a minute...

I just want to be Jo(sophine )cool about it all...

Fight Heats up

This was sent to me by the newsletter "The New Orleans Agenda" published by Vicent Sylvain of New Orleans. Interesting story and there is irony in this...

Fight Heats up over Discriminatory
Housing Laws in New Orleans area
Alice Walker, Oprah Winfrey,
and President Obama are pulled into local battle

By Jordan Flaherty NEW ORLEANS (9/11/09)
-

Rebuilding efforts in St. Bernard Parish, a
small community just outside New Orleans, have recently gotten a major boost.
One nonprofit focused on rebuilding in the area has received the endorsement of
CNN, Alice Walker, the touring production of the play The Color Purple, and even
President Obama. But an alliance of Gulf Coast and national organizations are
now raising questions about the cause these high profile names are supporting.
The dispute focuses on the responsibility of relief organizations to speak out
against injustice in the communities in which they work. Since September of
2006, St. Bernard Parish has been aggressive in passing racially discriminatory
laws and ordinances. Although these laws have faced condemnation in Federal
court and in the media, rebuilding organizations active in the parish have so
far refused to take a public position.



Racial discrimination has a long history in St.
Bernard politics. Judge Leander Perez, a fiery leader who dominated the parish
for almost 50 years, was known nationally as a spokesman for racial segregation.
The main road through the Parish was named after Perez, and his legacy still has
a hold on the political scene there. Lynn Dean, a member of the St Bernard
parish council told reporter Lizzy Ratner, "They don't want the blacks back . .
. What they'd like to do now with Katrina is say, we'll wipe out all of them.
They're not gonna say that out in the open, but how do you say? Actions speak
louder than words. There's their action."

The action Lynn was referencing is a "blood
relative" ordinance the council passed in 2006. The law made it illegal for
Parish homeowners to rent to anyone not directly related to the renter. In St
Bernard, which was 85% white before Katrina hit, this effectively kept African
Americans, many of whom were still displaced from New Orleans and looking for
nearby housing, from moving in. The Greater New Orleans Fair Housing Action
Center sued the Parish, saying the ordinance violated the 1968 Fair Housing Act.
A judge agreed, saying it was racially discriminatory in intent and impact. The
story doesn't end there. St. Bernard's government agreed to a settlement, but
the illegal ordinance was followed by another, blocking multi-family
construction in the Parish.

month, U.S. District Judge Ginger Berrigan found
the Parish to be in contempt of court, saying, "The Parish Council's intent . .
. is and was racially discriminatory." An editorial in the New Orleans
Times-Picayune agreed, saying, "This ruling strips off the camouflage and
reveals St. Bernard's actions for what they really are: an effort to keep lower-
income people and African-Americans from moving into the mostly white parish."
Relief Work Questioned St. Bernard Parish was heavily damaged by flooding in the
aftermath of Katrina. Thirteen percent of households lived below the federal
poverty line, and every home took in water.

Many organizations and volunteers have come
through to volunteer time and donate money, including United Way, Salvation
Army, and the Greater New Orleans Foundation. An organization called the St.
Bernard Project, which was founded in 2006 by two transplants from Washington,
DC, has become one of the most high profile organizations active in the region,
with millions of dollars in corporate and individual donations and thousands of
volunteers. This has been a big couple of weeks for the St. Bernard Project.

On August 29, President Obama mentioned them in
his weekly address, saying, "The St. Bernard Project has drawn together
volunteers to rebuild hundreds of homes, where people can live with dignity and
security." Last week, the touring production of the Broadway show The Color
Purple, produced by Oprah Winfrey, announced that they will be raising money for
the organization, and that author Alice Walker will be personally participating
in the fundraising.

Last year, CNN named co-founder Liz McCartney its
Hero of the Year. But this national acclamation has only increased criticisms of
the work happening in the Parish. Lance Hill, the executive director of the
Southern Institute for Education and Research at Tulane University, first raised
his voice on the issue in 2006, after the ordinance was passed. Hill is quick to
point out that he is not against rebuilding work in the Parish. However, he
adds, "If they chose to rebuild homes that Blacks and Jews would be barred from,
at a minimum they have a moral obligation to inform volunteers of the policies
of the Parish. To not do so is to mislead volunteers and donors and to become
complicit with racism."

Hill is also one of the signatories of an open
letter, released this week, which expresses deep concerns over rebuilding
efforts in the parish. "Regrettably, many relief and volunteer organizations
chose not to respond to the 'blood relative' law, remaining silent on this
issue," the letter states. "With the benefit of hindsight, we now know that St.
Bernard Parish officials interpreted silence as consent, which has now
emboldened this rogue government to pursue other means to defy the Fair Housing
Act."

Organizers say that the letter is intended to
pressure organizations to think about larger issues of injustice as they work in
the region. "It is time that we take a stand against housing discrimination in
St. Bernard and throughout the Gulf Coast," the letter states. "And make clear
what the moral imperatives are for all organizations that seek to rebuild the
Gulf Coast as a fair and just society."

Among the signers of the letter are human rights
organizations like the National Economic and Social Rights Initiative, regional
groups like Moving Forward Gulf Coast, and local initiatives like MayDay Nola,
which works on housing in New Orleans. Zack Rosenburg, the cofounder of St.
Bernard Project, is angered by the complaints of Hill and others. "We are not an
advocacy group and we're not commenting on that," he told me, referring to the
laws of the Parish. "We're helping people get home." Rosenburg added that at
least 30% of the families they have worked with have been African American, and
he asked me to "think about the Black families who are living in FEMA trailers
and want to move home, before writing this piece . . . try to build things up
instead of pulling things down."


Lance Hill and other advocates claim that working
on relief without challenging systemic injustices actually exacerbates the
problem. They point out that the number of houses rebuilt for African Americans
in the community - perhaps two hundred at the most, if you include all
nonprofits working in the area - pales in comparison to the thousands that have
potentially been excluded by the laws of the parish.

"The main reason that these relief groups have
had to disproportionately rebuild Black rentals," explains Hill, "is because the
Parish is tearing down or blocking construction of affordable housing faster
than the relief groups can rebuild." "This is why this issue in St. Bernard has
troubled me so much," adds Hill. "Exclusion is at the core of the injustices of
Katrina. The deliberate efforts to prevent people from returning and the denial
that these policies and practices were in place has been the central issue. The
exclusionary ideology that was widespread in the white community in New Orleans
became law in St. Bernard."

Organizers hope that the multiple levels of
pressure will ultimately challenge elected officials in St. Bernard Parish to
make the area an example of rebuilding with justice for all. "Our silence
doesn't help anybody," says Hill. "It destroys more than the relief groups can
ever dream of building."

Jordan Flaherty is a journalist, an editor of
Left Turn Magazine, and a staffer with the Louisiana Justice Institute. He was
the first writer to bring the story of the Jena Six to a national audience and
his reporting on post-Katrina New Orleans shared a journalism award from New
America Media. Audiences around the world have seen the television reports he's
produced for Al- Jazeera, TeleSur, GritTV, and Democracy Now.

He can be reached at neworleans@leftturn.org.

On the Winds of Order-Hurricane Gustav & the Gulf Coast

" Down the Road"©08JHM Photography

You can complain because roses have thorns. Or you can rejoice that thorns have roses.

- Ziggy

In fact bear with me as I speak here as I am still in the middle of processing things.

Since we knew Hurricane Gustav was heading to the U.S. I've been able to reach perhaps 75% of the people I know in the Gulf Coast happily being able to say did indeed evacuated. What a relief though of course I know of some who just rebuilt there homes

I want to implore people who are watching not to make presumptions about the people who stayed behind as it may not what you think. Some have stayed because they have sick family members who could not be moved to the Children's Hospital who had babies, yes babies who have had heart surgery or born prematurely and who evacuating them would be certain death to the man who felt he could not leave because he felt he would be abandoning his wife. They tried to leave during Katrina and the roads were so impacted that they decided to go back home. His wife drowned....Perhaps for grief? Loyalty? Remorse?

Can we not understand that? Most of the ones who have stayed which is roughly about 10,00 are in the higher areas of N.O which did not sustain devastating damage in Katrina.

But in my thinking as I am watching this irony occur and hoping along with everyone else that the partially redone levees hold when lo and behold they showed my childhood area of the Lower Ninth Wards and the levees with the water over topping.

Looking at this impacted to me why it is important that these levees hold. This will tell the tale. Plus in a ironic way the Westbank which was the area that turned on other New Orleaninans with guns and blocked a foot evacuation threatening to shoot to kill as they did not want "those people" there now in a twist of fate now are being tried and tested. The levees on the Westbank did not break in Katrina & thusly no one knows if they will hold or even post Katrina if they have had defects due to aging or defects.

No one would know until a storm came and Gustav is now providing the test. But using the reasoning of Gustav this is an opportunity to do what a African proverb states "It is no shame to go back and correct what was not done" or as the Bible states godly sadness that befits repentance one being righting the wrong.

Perhaps things that were out of order during Katrina will be put into order this go around. Kinda like Gustav stating (if winds could talk) "I sent my little sister Katrina and you did not heed, so now big brother Gustav has to come along for emphasis". Gustav meaning is "royal staff" or "Staff of the Goths".There were apparently a number of European royalty with the name Gustav. Katrina also German translated means "pure".

Of course I am saying this somewhat tongue in cheek but sometimes the test may not be for the person or thing that is experiencing the difficulty but for the observers as to what they are going to do (or not do).

Ironically just a couple of weeks ago some of us were talking about how the Gulf Coast appeared to be forgotten as people went about their lives and things, challenges and other events crowded in. The economy, gasoline, job loss, dispossed homes, bankruptcies etc. Katrina was not any longer a worthy news bite as people decided "those people" should have been better by now to the "oh they are just whining wanting handouts" to "I got my own problems" forgetting that these are real people and that a Katrina like event can happen to each and everyone of us in some way, Even if we manage something life changing once, it could again and again and again and again..

Someone told me and I do not know the author that "one can be irritated to greatness" meaning being pushed and prodded and molded and tried into being a better person then we once were. One thing about going through iron hitting against iron it makes it a stronger more useful material. Some of us will develop a greater capacity for fellow feeling and action.

Will that be you? Will it be me or someone else?

However there are people that will dig there heels in and fight with all their might to the death figuratively or literally to resist what may need to be altered or done. (Or undone) But yet others will rise up and make extraordinary changes (for themselves) That extraordinary change may be just a blip to other people but may be exactly what it needs to be for the one who is making said change.

So now where will you (or I) be when it is our time which is now?

That may be for ones who are doing things like needing to make major changes in their life or even minor one i.e losing 5, 25 or 105 pounds for health or walking away from a dangerous home life, changing careers or like in my position doing this Moon's Great Adventure. At the end of the first phase of this, I do not know where I will indeed lay my head, but I do know that I have no regrets doing this as if I had stayed where I was wringing my hands all I would have now 7 weeks later I would have been still sitting there wringing my hands.

I can tell you that since I took that first step toward putting things in order, my pain level has decreased about 50% and up until a few days ago the heart palpitations had totally ceased. I am feeling more and more like my old self, but in actuality better then even my old self. Though not all of the experiences have been uplifting, of the types that movies are made of, they though have been powerful.

I am still processing them and may for sometime to come. But I will have to say that 95& of the adventure thus far have been powerful and good.

Ironically if it had not been for a totally unexpected & unplanned for glitch about 3 weeks ago I would have been in New Orleans last week & this. That was part of my scheduled plan and would have been on one of those bus, gus getting out of there! This is the second time (for emphasis) that I was delayed or a circumstance change where I was suppose to be, the other time being Katrina, that prevented me from being in harm's way and put me in a position to where I could be of better service.

So initially as I reflect back on 3 weeks ago what seemed to be a major glitch now is a blessing in disguise and I didn't even know it. What was different was I handled the glitch, changing lanes and kept on pressing. One thing about trials one will indeed learned resiliency unless they fight tooth and nail to resist being molded that comes or when things need to be put in order.

So now where we will be?

I know for me I will continue as the Chinese proverb states "Fall down seven... Get up eight".

Even under these sad circumstances and people are anxious, worried not knowing what will await them, there is still a guarded optimism that perhaps what was not there the first time is now in place and in the end it will gonna be alright.

And how cool is that?