I was born in New Orleans, I grew up in New Orleans. I was married there, worked there, my son started life there, my parents are buried there. All of my family and most of my friends all live there. I got fat there as the food quality is legendary, and there is no such thing as a bad retaurant.

On the morning of August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina ploughed into my city, striking land just east of New Orleans, and devastating the entire Gulf Coast strip from New Orleans to Mobile, devastaing everything. It was a world I had known my entire life, and in a few short hours it was reduced to a nightmare of misery and destruction.

But what I am feeling most of all, is grief and sorrow over the wounding of my beloved city. It is a place which has many things I dislike, but at the same time I love it with all my soul. You have to be from New Orleans to understand how its natives feel about that city. We know every inch of her. We know her history, her traditions, her culture. We listen to the same Mardi Gras songs on the radio every year. We observe Lent and St.Joseph's Day even if we aren't Catholic. In the schools, our kids still celebrate Christmas and Hanukkah. We groan about her cracked roads and laugh at the inconveniently-placed canals that break up a major thoroughfare into three streets with different names so that you need a map to find your way around Metairie -- unless you live there and know the ropes. We all know and love the French Quarter, the Audubon Zoo, City Park and its Christmas Light Show, the Aquarium, the praulines, and we weave around the streets from Thanksgiving to twelfth Night, dazzled by holiday light displays that sometimes rival Las Vegas. We all yell, "Who Dat Gonna beat Dem Saints?" even if we hate football, and "Throw me somethin' Mister!" has only one meaning.

Only natives call begniets & latte "coffee & donuts". Only natives call carousel ponies on a grand old Victorian roundabout "Flying Horses". Only natives know what K&B Purple is, what Pontchartrain Beach used to be, and who Morgus the Magnificent & Chopsley were, and who Uncle Henry and the Great MacNutt were. We are the only people in the world not shocked by a bus line called "Cemetaries" and hundreds of graves standing above the ground, or by crossing bridges and canals to see the rooftops of houses below, or to stand on a sidewalk near a canal and look up to see ocean-going ships sailing over the same rooftops like castles in the air. Only natives know the difference between a bead and a dubloon, buy fresh blue crabs by the dozen, and know why Popeye is more than a brand name for a fried chicken chain. Only the natives prnounce the city's name correctly and know the meanings of such words and phrases as "lagnaippe", "banquet", "neutral ground", and "makin' groceries" -- And only the natives know that Mardi Gras is not a just a day set aside for drunken brawl and streets full of girls-gone-wild (as the media would have you believe), but a month-long holiday of parades, carnivals, and family entertainment since Mardi Gras is what you make of it. And where else can we get King Cakes and hunt for the "Baby Jesus" inside?

New Orleans is unique, and there is nothing else like her. I have travelled to many places, both in America and in other countries, but New Orleans remains unique. And for all her many faults, I am proud to call her my home. I am grieving for her because she may come back, but she will never be the same again.

So here is a toast to New Orleans - the city I hate and adore, the city that made me what I am, and the city that is much a part of me as my own heart.

The following pages are a photographic tribute to New Orleans. The pictures may not be the kind you see on postcards or travel brochures, but they are real pictures which I took on visits home to be with family and friends for the holidays. I hope you enjoy them as a last glimpse of what once was. And as I find more, I shall add them on.