Killer Katrina

On the way to work Thursday morning I saw Katrina in the east snaking its lowly way off our continent and back out into the ocean.

Good riddance, you killer.

The commute was quite moving thinking about those retreating and seemingly innocent clouds that a few days earlier left a ruined landscape behind when they appeared on land 1,500 miles south of us. A category five storm, Katrina whacked our southern friends and will whack our economy from now until who-knows-when.

Watching the news Tuesday night, I felt as if Sept. 11 had happened again. Maybe you felt the same way. Thinking about that feeling, and reliving that post-Sept. 11 pit in my stomach, isn’t something I want to dwell on, but the feeling of personal powerlessness in the face of Mother Nature and sadness for all those suffering is truly a moving experience.

Grief is moving. It’s a life-changing emotion. Literally, for the survivors of the levee breaks in New Orleans, grief is moving. And they’re still on the move as we speak. In buses, walking along the highways, being airlifted from their homes; it’s a tragic exodus. Similar to New Yorkers walking out of town across the East River on roads usually reserved for fast-moving cars, refugees are fleeing another American city in ruin.

One family on the move is the Clements-Bragdon family, who have ties to Windham and Naples. (See the page one story, please.) Both teachers down in The Big Easy, the couple took their three children and dog and high-tailed it out of the south in hopes of dryer and safer climes. Maine was their refuge, as it is for many of us who have chosen to make this place our home.

Welcome to Kurtis and Ann as well as to your three kids, and anyone else who may have taken refuge here. Here’s praying that your home is all right and you and your southern neighbors are able to get back to normal soon.

Kioskian innocence

On a lighter, less dastardly note, we have a story this week about kiosks the ever-vigilant Portland Water District has erected in hopes of discouraging reckless foot traffic in the watershed surrounding Lower Bay. Some like the new rules, some do not. But one thing’s for sure, access to the beauty that is the Lakes Region is decreasing by the year.

During the debate whether to turn the Standish Boat Launch into an environmental park, I remember Standish Town Councilor Dolores Lymburner lamenting the fact the town would lose the area as a place to sit in a vehicle to overlook beautiful Sebago Lake. Unless you have a million dollar home on the lake or can afford the $20 fee to launch a boat, a view of the lake is nearly impossible to get anymore, except maybe at 55 mph past Raymond Boat Ramp.

Lymburner’s right. There are too few places around the lake to cozy up to the shore’s edge and eat lunch in your car. And let’s face it, that’s what a lot of people want to do. We’re not all boaters or swimmers or fishermen. Some of us just want to be able to look and relax. Losing that ability, if it ever happens, will be sad.

Closing the boat launch is not currently on the table, although the boat launch’s future seems perennially in doubt. But a similar thing is happening on the district’s 2,500 acres surrounding the Lower Bay. Walkers must now ask permission each time they go on the land. A spirit of limitation is in full force, with a full-time security person ready to catch trespassers.

You can’t fault the water district for ramping up security, but that doesn’t mean we can’t lament the fact it’s happening. No one wants the Greater Portland water supply to get contaminated. But we also don’t want Standish people losing access to trails they have always enjoyed. The man profiled in the page 11 kiosks story this week is one such guy. Most people know Karl Hartwell, perhaps from dropping a package off at The UPS Store in Windham, and know he’s a kind, gentle man. It seems so silly to write this guy a warning for something he’s been doing for years and years: walking in the woods hunting for blueberries. Come on. There’s got to be better ways of spending ratepayers’ money than bullying Karl.

Water district officials are gracious for allowing continued access, albeit a more limited access. We should be glad we can fill out a form and hop along our merry way down a trail. But it’s the principle that has me sighing; lamenting the loss of innocence even here in the relatively safe Lakes Region.

But, I guess we can thank the terrorists for Karl’s lost freedom to ramble around in the district’s woods. Everything comes back to them, doesn’t it?