Katrina ran people out of the city, and left houses and gardens, first, underwater, and, then, untended to, for weeks.

M and A and I didn't get to check on our home until mid-October, and then we spent only one fretful night in our deserted neighborhood with no electricity, no streetlights, no food. The next day, A and I went back to Houston, and M returned to Baton Rouge. For months, New Orleans had no rain. I didn't water the garden the couple of times I came home because the water pressure was almost nil, and what was the point? People had lost everything, 80 percent of the city had been ruined, and we didn't know when we'd be back.

The garden sat there patiently waiting for water during weeks of no-rain. Jesus: This city couldn't get even the break of a hard, cleansing thunderstorm. But! But! In December, we were back in the house, and the camellias bloomed like crazy. What encouraged them? I don't know. And then the gardenias came back, smelling like broken paradise, the plumbago burst into purple flowers, the pentas lured butterflies back, the agapanthus stood tall, cocky, and I've been chastened by a garden that never gave up.



These days, I'm a watering fool. I move the sprinkler from one section of the garden to another, soaking the ground that held so many dried-out plants with worried, abiding roots.



A piece of terracotta blew off the peak of our roof and onto the flower bed in the front, and we're leaving it there to remember how 120 mph winds disrespect fifty pound ornamental roof things.



And the mourning doves . . . well, they started a nest a few weeks ago then must've changed their mind. They've been coming back to this spot year after year, but maybe they don't trust the spring, or meteorology, or maybe they are going to stay in the place where they evacuated, like the 180,000 other concerned people in New Orleans.