You may or may not have seen this photo in the media over the past couple of days. I'd noticed it, but in the midst of such a deluge of images and information over the past week, it didn't stand out that much to me.

And then last night, I read a short paragraph about the photo.

"In New Orleans' Garden District, a woman's body lay at the corner of Jackson Avenue and Magazine Street — a business area with antique shops on the edge of blighted housing. The body had been there since at least Wednesday. As days passed, people covered the corpse with blankets or plasticIn New Orleans' Garden District, a woman's body lay at the corner of Jackson Avenue and Magazine Street — a business area with antique shops on the edge of blighted housing. The body had been there since at least Wednesday. As days passed, people covered the corpse with blankets or plastic."

Jackson and Magazine. Jackson and Magazine. Jackson and Magazine.

Suddenly I couldn't process it... that's two block from where I lived the past five years. Two blocks. It's a corner I walked by hundreds of times. It's my neighborhood. A dead body laying on the street for days. In my neighborhood.

Last year, when Ivan was headed towards New Orleans, almost everyone I knew evacuated New Orleans. I stayed.

The night before the storm came onto land, when we still weren't certain if it was going to hit us or not, I slowly started to freak out a little bit. I dealt with it by getting a little drunk and then going a block down my street and befriending the group of older black ladies who were hanging out outside of their Section 8 apartment building. They stayed because they had no where to go, no money to travel with, no transportation of their own.

I found myself trying to remember if any of them was named Vera last night. I can't imagine how they fared at the Convention Center, which I have to imagine became their shelter. I wonder where they are now.

My neighborhood. In my neighborhood... it's made it all a little more raw again for me.