My Baby Doll

No, not the Madame Alexander from MaMere in her lap; my baby doll is that little girl who today turns 17, my daughter Killian. Looking at this picture you can see we had not finished unpacking the boxes in the background after ur evacuation of Washington, DC to the suburbs of Arlington, VA. When we moved out we left behind us a neighborhood where three people had died in close proximity to our house, where not just sporadic gun fire but gun battles following the popping pattern of a pan of jiffy pop were a routine occurrence, where the helicopters of the DCPD would hover over our block with their powerful searchlights.

It was not a good place for my wife and small daughter to be home alone all day, or a comfortable place to lay our heads down at night.

Today she is a 17 year old young woman living in a city not much different than the one we fled almost 20 years ago. I want her to be safe as much today as when this picture was taken, as much as I will when I am very old and she has children of her own. And I want her to be able to stay in her adopted home of New Orleans, where outside of the inescapable hazards of teenage life she is genuinely happy with a large circle of friends, where she relishes Mardi Gras and Jazz Fest and Voodoo and hanging at the Fly.

I do not want to have to retreat, again. I will not uproot my family again. But she must be safe, as my wife and my 13-year old son must be safe. A long time ago I wrote that all I wanted for Christmas was New Orleans. On this birthday, what I want to give my daughter is a New Orleans she can enjoy without fear, free of the dangers on the mean streets. I have to find a way.

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