Yolanda Seals

Abstract

While growing up in the Lower Nine two blocks from Lawless High School, Yolanda Seals, the great-granddaughter of a Native American woman, longed for summer vacations in Natchez, Mississippi. Born in 1969, Yolanda grew up in a very different environment from that of Copelin, Roberts, Ferdinand, Salaam, or Duplessis. As the oldest sibling, she was deputized by her father, the manager of the A & P store, to make sure the other children came home safely. Before the storm, she was a homeowner in Violet, a hamlet in St. Bernard parish, and a social worker for Catholic Charities in New Orleans. On August 28, 2005, she left the city with her four children to go to Atlanta for what she thought would be an extended holiday weekend at Six Flags.

This chapter is based on two interviews recorded in cramped hotel rooms on the outskirts of Atlanta on February 7, and March 31, 2006.¹ On both daysy Yolanda arrived dressed professionally with her make-up still flawless at the end of a very long work day spent assisting elderly New Orleanians and overwhelmed single mothers transitioning out of hotels into apartments. Her narration deftly interwove her personal and professional observations.

The dream of a vibranty socioeconomically integrated Lower Ninth Ward had died in the Tennessee Street neighborhood of Yolanda’syouthy which was dominated by illicit drug trade. Yolanda represents members of a generation of New Orleanians who grew up without the love of neighborhood that makes exile painful for most New Orleanians. She therefore embraced the dislocation to Atlanta as an opportunity to start over. She enrolled her children in school, bought a new home, and landed two jobs within weeks of settling into her newly adopted city.

This chapter is dedicated to the memory of Freddie Seals Sr.