Julia Neph:  

en a different major, but oh well. What matters most about my years in college was the fact that I got my degree even while raising a young daughter without any support from her father, working full time, multiple jobs at a time, and building my relationship with Art. Workplace Hi! I just wanted to tell you about my trip to Gulfport, Mississippi with the Red Cross after Hurricane Katrina. The reason I went out there, was because like many others, after Hurricane Katrina hit, I was a CNN junkie, and watched the coverage non-stop. As I sat in my comfortable living room safe in my wonderful home, I felt so terrible for the victims of the hurrincane, and knew I must do whatever I could to help them. I donated, food, money, and clothing, but that just didn’t seem like enough. So I went online to the Red Cross website, and found out that they were doing training sessions, and you would be deployed to go out to be a Red Cross worker to help the victims of the hurricane. I procrastinated for a couple days, wondering if I was up to the task, both physically and mentally, and realized that the victims had no choice in the matter, and neither would I. I woke up one morning and God told me to go and help these people. Not being and very spiritual or religious person, when God speaks to me I tend to pay attention. So I called the Red Cross and scheduled my training session for Sept. 17th. In the meantime, I began working as a volunteer at the Central Maryland Chapter Headquarters answering the phones and scheduling others for the deployment trainings. After finishing my training I was called on 28th to fly out to Gulfport, Mississippi. I flew out on Friday September 30th. I stayed at the Naval Construction Battallion (C.B.) Base in Gulfport, with 600 other Red Cross volunteers in a concrete warehouse type building. Cots were lined up side by side, and young and old, men and women all slept in the same room. I was assigned to work in the Community Services Section, I drove in a box truck and picked up pallets of food and water from a warehouse and transported them to a Red Cross Financial Aid Service Center that was set up in the middle of a field in a large tent. My job was to make sure that the people who were coming in to receive financial aid stayed hydrated, and had snacks. They were out in 90+ degree heat and many were old, infirm, or had small children. As the first Red Crossers at the site people came into contact with, we made sure that we offered any help we could to people coming in, whether that be a shortcut to the front of the line, if circumstances warranted that, or information about other community aid services available to them. We heard so many heartbreaking stories of loss, and met so many people in need. We also met some extremely wonderful and grateful people who were so thankful that we had come from all over the country to help them in there time of need. We had the opportunity to drive through the beachfront area of Gulfport, as well as the areas of Waveland, Slidell, St. Bernard’s Parish, the lower 9th ward, and the French Quarter of New Orleans. The devastation was simply incredible, and I hope I never have to see anything like it again in my lifetime. It will take years for these areas to remove the debris, rebuilt and recover. The gulf coast will need help for a very long time, and I hope the American people will continue to help them in the future with that recovery. I have pictures that I will send you if you are interested. Please e-mail or call me if you would like to hear more about the trip. I feel that the more people know about what the circumstances are like out there, the more likely they will be to continue to help. Thanks! ~Jazzy~ Military Sorry no military experience of my own.. but I lost my first boyfriend and first true love to military when he enlisted after he graduated high school I was only in 9th grade and he was the best thing that ever happened to me back then. Once he left it was never the same again between us.. the damn Navy! But, we stayed in contact for a few years... lost contact for many more years....., and are now long distance friends again, thanks to the internet! Both of very happy in our lives!