It was only a quick trip home to see family and eat as many shrimp as possible. It quickly deteriorated into a flight for our lives.

After checking the national weather, as I always do before departing for New Orleans, I found there was a hurricane on the east side of Florida. Its projected course put its landfall at Tallahassee. It was not a huge hurricane. I departed early the next morning and did not give Katrina a second thought.

When I arrived in New Orleans, Katrina had moved into the warm waters of the Gulf and strengthened considerably. We began to pack to leave immediately for Houston.

I was so thankful to have transportation and ready funds to do so. So many of my former neighbors did not have such advantages. I felt so sorry for the poor, sick and the elderly left behind. I hitched a ride with my sister, and we fled like so many to Houston. Everyone I know is homeless. The infrastructure is completely destroyed. Most will not be able to drive to work across the watery state of Louisiana without the aid of bridges. There is no future for them in their hometown. With any luck they may have electricity and water services within six months. Disease will kill more than the storm and flooding. They do not know when they can get the water from the streets.

Although I did not lose a house, I did lose a home. Everything I know of home is destroyed. I have spent the three days since my escape to higher ground trying to reach my missing brother. Has anyone seen Whitie Michael Roshto?

There are so many people worse off than myself, but I did want to tell my story. I have sat here paralyzed like the rest of the country watching the horror unfold. Then suddenly today my sadness turned to anger. I saw several unbelievable things on CNN and Fox.

Bush was acting like he had no idea this was going to happen. He may be able to lie to the rest of the country, but he can not lie to the New Orleanians. We were there in 2002 when he was warned that this could happen and he still reallocated our levee money to Iraq. Our levees have needed to be reinforced for years because of coastal erosion.

Large storms such as Katrina were traditionally broken up by small coastal barrier islands. Because of Mississippi River pollution from chemical plants upstate, our river is no longer building its delta. Louisiana is quickly deteriorating. How could the president not know?

The first President Bush was on TV today too. He said the administration was doing well with a rough situation. He defended the president's performance. Maybe we could comfort the rape victims of the Superdome with that. Maybe we can comfort the people without food and water with that.

Then it occurred to me. I may be safe from Katrina, but I do not trust this administration to give me aid in the aftermath of a terrorist attack! How well has our government done? How can I feel safe?

-- Carol Roshto-Smith

I've been talking to my relatives in Mobile, Ala., every day. My uncle is an attorney in Mobile. Wednesday he started calling clients, mostly seniors, checking up on them. He got in touch with one, a 60-year-old man who lives outside of town. Fella's lived in his house all his life, his parents lived there, his grandparents lived there, his great-grandparents lived there. Maybe his great-great-grandparents, too, that I'm not sure about. But the house was in the family for four generations.

He and his family evacuated, headed north before Katrina hit, leaving behind (among other things) a couple of older cars. When they came back to the property, there was nothing there. No cars, no house, not even rubble. It was like in the "Wizard of Oz," when the tornado lifts the farmhouse up off its foundations. Telling my uncle what happened, the man broke down and cried. His ancestral home was gone.

My grandfather's cousin came to visit my grandparents Wednesday night. Told them about this guy, friend of his, used to be his neighbor, now lives way up in Baton Rouge, whose parents are an elderly couple who live in a small town outside Mobile, about a hundred feet from the Gulf coast. Water came up, flooded the first floor; they went into the second story. Water came up further; they went into the attic. Water came up into the attic, but didn't fill it. They counted themselves lucky when the National Guard pulled them out.

Somehow they called their son up in Baton Rouge, and he drove down back roads and made it to them, and started to drive back to Baton Rouge and ran out of gas. Which is a problem -- almost all the gas stations in Mobile are closed. So their son called my grandfather's cousin, who had a full tank of gas, and my grandfather's cousin drove out and met them, and siphoned 10 gallons into their tank, which was enough for them to get out of Alabama and far enough toward Baton Rouge they could buy more gas. The elderly couple was talking about how lucky they were, because they'd made it into their attic. Their next-door neighbors hadn't been so lucky.

"These stories have been coming in all day," my grandfather told me this morning.

-- Jeff Wikstrom

I live in Zachary, a northern suburb of Baton Rouge. Zachary is the northernmost point of East Baton Rouge Parish and the last city with state-of-the-art anything -- everything north of Zachary is extremely rural. Thus many people are being shipped here.

Zachary has its own school district. The city was planning on keeping the schools open today, Wednesday, as they did yesterday. But then the governor ordered all buses be sent to evacuate Superdome and Convention Center refugees. The buses were all ready to go but were stopped because unfortunately the safety of the drivers couldn't be assured. This was supposed to be handled by added National Guardsmen and military personnel who haven't made it here yet.

I have heard many heartbreaking, depressing stories that are extremely hard to take. Some people tried to ride the storm out and stay. Some, believe it or not, didn't know a hurricane was coming, while others either simply got the warning too late or couldn't afford to leave. Many have talked about having to fight their way into attics from raging flood waters. Others have talked of talking to loved ones who were in the attic, with little breathing room left, when their phones went dead.

Flooding is obviously a major problem. But what people fail to realize are the psychological problems that can be caused by flooding, by not having food or water or just watching people die. One lady said some people became so psychologically unstable that they started a shootout with one another, screaming that they were going to die anyway and didn't care if they lived.

All in our community welcome our fellow Americans warmly and many are willing to share homes, churches, damn near anything. But depression has started to set in. It isn't just knowing that our quiet community has completely changed, but that we are now in a situation where our town's banks, convenience stores and gas stations are being robbed.

I won't pretend to understand the plight and pain of those who have lost everything. Throughout this whole storm our electricity never even went out. I am an African-American man fortunate enough to live in an ultra-safe town, with great schools, front and back yards, a basketball court, money in my pocket and hundred-dollar sneakers. But I am one of the very few. The people who are looting in New Orleans have none of them, and now they are in a dire situation. People in America have to understand their mindset.

But having said that, we've lost something more valuable than electricity -- our comfort level, our bubble of safety and security. All of a sudden we have to start locking doors and being fearful of just going to get milk. Help is here in my community and we will do as much as possible, but  well, I'll just end it here by saying it sucks.

-- Kevin Criss

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