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12/20/05

Journal entry from 12.15.05

Wonderful day on the train. Left Memphis at 6AM... sun came up over cloud bank as I ate railroad french toast covered with Arlo's new Battleground Maple Syrup (he brings his own syrup!) in the dining car... scenery changing as fallow fields turn to scrub woods then swamp land… small towns, towns from a bygone age... a railroad  age...

afternoon --lot of singing and hi spirits on the train today.. just did an impromptu concert in the observation lounge with local and national media in attendance... Started with Gordon and I and grew... AG finally joined us and we all sang ROTCONO as the sunlight streamed in and this beautiful country rolled by outside our window... as we approached New Orleans the mood has become more somber… blue FEMA tarps, at first occasional, now becoming regular sights - stretched over damaged roofs of houses… oil refineries rusted metal roofs and barbed wired debris bad getting  worse now -battle zone -trees over turned, cars upended, spray painted messages, waterline etched on houses, echoes of profound grief... It feels like we're coming on to holy ground.

12/19

I’m just home from New Orleans... so much to tell. Journal entries and thoughts will be posted over the next week or so... but I'll begin with the end... my last morning there:

The police escorted us on a tour of the Ninth Ward and Saint Bernard's Parish on Friday. What we saw defies description.  They don't just need journalists to tell this story. They truly need poets. Words in customary groupings and associations aren't up to the task of conveying what happened here. Yet the spirit of this town survives and endures. There is hope amid so much devastation. I found it in the words of my cab driver to the airport today. His name was Nicholas Dieufumaite. He is a middle aged man, born in Haiti, who came to this country 20 years ago. Nicholas, like everyone else we met in New Orleans, has astonishing stories to tell but when I asked him the most important thing he wanted me to convey to folks when I got back home he responded, (paraphrasing pretty close here…)“Tell them ‘thank you’. Yes, ‘thank you’ for all they will do for us. MY country, the United States, will not turn its back on us. It’s citizens are our brothers and sisters and they will give without thinking of themselves when they understand how desperate things are here. They will give, just as we would give to them if they were hurting so badly. Please tell them 'thank you'!” Preemptive gratitude from a man who trusts us all to help. Now we have a whole bunch of work to do if we're going to find a way to be deserving of that faith and tell Nicholas “You’re welcome.”
 

12/14/05
Hello from Memphis, Tennessee! We have a day off from the tour and I got an early run in along the banks of the Mississippi this morning, The shows have been great and are picking up steam… Crowds building and more and more press and cameras greet us at each station -CNN, local news, network stuff - front page of Wall St. Journal yesterday - folks are arriving from all over the country. One guy who met up with us in Carbondale, Illinois is driving along the train route, all the way down to Louisiana in a truck full of donated pianos brought from Ithaca New York! I'm also psyched because when we get to New Orleans I’ve been asked to do a kids show on a cruise ship where some of the evacuated families are staying!  I’ve been enjoying it all immensely- kind of like folk music Disneyland , traveling and performing with so many wonderful artists.  During my sets, I’ve been joined on stage each night by Arlo’s amazing pedal steel player, Gordon Titcomb, along with Abe Guthrie, his band Xavier, and Annie, Kathy and Sarah Lee Guthrie… I’ve also gotten to know Guy Davis a little bit (powerful music and wonderful sense of humor) and the legendary Ramblin’ Jack Elliot who was in the front row while I sang last night and has dubbed me “The John Lennon of the plasma generation” (even Jack admits he doesn’t know quite what this means.) We all end up on stage each night with Arlo, the whole crowd on its feet, singing Steve Goodman’s anthem. As we take our bows Arlo thanks the audience for coming, saying” We’d love to stay and play some more, but we’ve got a train to catch !”   More soon...