Down the Road, Louisiana, 2013. William takes us on the boat to see what’s left of his watery childhood playground. He is our extended family. Connected to us by marriage. He is a crabber, and that profession goes many generations up. Fast forward: It’s five years later, so the land on either side of this waterway is probably gone by now. Collapsed in on itself. Taken by that bastard Climate Change. Y’all, I’m from here. Not from cultural and sophisticated New Orleans, but from working class Southeast Louisiana. My family moved from one swampy town to the next following the work. I played in bayous and shot guns and fished and crabbed in wetlands with long dead family menfolk. Yesterday, I read in Scientific America that Southeast Louisiana will be underwater in my lifetime. I will lose my homeland in my lifetime. I am trying to come to terms with this.
