Jermol Stinson

Abstract

Born in 1969, Jermol Stinson joined the Merchant Marines at the age of eighteen and traveled around the world. While home on leave four years later, Jermol was a victim of violence that left him paralyzed from the neck down. In New Orleans, friends and family provided round-the-clock care at home, even before there was money to pay anyone. One young St. Augustine student, Anthony, did his homework on the floor of Jermol’s room each night. After several bouts with severe depression, he began working as an inspirational speaker at the Bridge City Center for Youth in Jefferson Parish. A practicing Muslim, Jermol was recovering from an infection at Kindred Hospital in Uptown immediately before Katrina. He was trapped in New Orleans during and after the storm, and during the storm’s aftermath he wandered in his mind throughout the city, as he actively worried about his family and friends. Once he was stabilized in Dallas, he entered his first nursing home.

On January 15, 2006, this interview was conducted during a lull in the stream of visitors in and out of Jermol’s Dallas hospital room.¹ He was in the hospital for surgery required to address the bedsores he acquired in the nursing home. A white towel wrapped around his head like a turban, Jermo’s eyes revealed much emotion as he talked. His frequent smile revealed three or four gold-capped teeth.

Jermo’s story at times is a love song to New Orleans. His love for the city is sensual and represents the intermingling of deep family roots and a rich sense of history of place. Hurricane Katrina and the subsequent flood seriously damaged or disrupted the sources of Jermo’s independence, something most disabled people value highly and struggle to secure. He lost his expensive, adaptive equipment and an intimate familiarity with his city of residence, but more importantly, the storm scattered his extended network of friends and family, who enabled both Jermol and his mother, Cynthia Banks, to live full lives. The constant stream of visitors in and out of his hospital room is an indication of his charisma, essential to restoring his stability so that he can draft a new roadmap for his life.