Camaraderie On The Gulf Coast

Photo by Mike Houck

While PDX 2 Gulf Coast’s mission was to bear witness to the socio-economic, social and environmental impacts of the BP spill, I’m convinced that new friendships and respect for each teammate’s contribution, and recognition that we were all dedicated to the collective effort, will be stand out in the end.

When twenty-odd people, most of whom had never laid eyes on one another before, share four vans and sleep together in dormitory bunk beds and — at best — sketchy motels, for more than a week, share incredibly moving experiences with Gulf Coast residents — and one another — bearing witness to the emotional toll the spill has caused, take breakfast, lunch and dinner together, and engage in occasional nighttime partying to relieve the day’s built-up tensions, there are only two plausible outcomes: Chaos or intense bonding. We experienced large quantities of both. Chaos certainly reined morning and evening as we struggled with which direction we were headed and who was going to ride in which van.

Happily, but not at all surprisingly, bonding trumped chaos — most of the time — for two reasons. First, we were all drawn like proverbial moths to the flame by Mike Rosen’s passion. In my case Rosen called me at home to say he’d awoken at 3 am after first hearing about the spill and wanted to know if I’d accompany him and other Portlanders to the Gulf Coast.  ”No, friggin way,” was my first response. Too much to do.  ”For God’s sake,” I told Rosen, “Sallinger and I are working on a damn book!”  Within a week we’d both agreed to go, based totally on Rosen’s drive and belief that this project needed to be done.

Second, while there were some significant personalities among our eclectic contingent, from the get go it was clear everyone was there for the cause, not their ego. From day one it was clear individual needs were irrelevant.

A day later, several of us went to the Grand Isle, Louisiana command center for a much anticipated boat tour to view search and rescue missions for injured wildlife. The first setback came when some of us were challenged by the Fish and Wildlife Service public relations officer because we were “merely” educators or conservationists—sans “media credentials.” Our comrades, The Oregonian’s Steve Duin and Portland Tribune’s Jennifer Anderson were steadfast in their insistence that we’d come along with them, credentialed or not. They made that abundantly clear to the ‘crat. After significant cajoling, it was agreed that we, the un-credentialed would be allowed to accompany our journalist colleagues, albeit on a second, non-media, boat. In the end all the negotiating was moot. Impending storms canceled all trips into the bay, media accredited and educators alike.

However, undoubtedly, the single most frustrating disappointment of our tour had to be when videographer John Waller realized he’d forgotten his ID and was turned away from a fifty-mile helicopter trip out to the Deep Horizon site. Despite his deep disappointment, Waller rose to the occasion. When any reasonable response would have been to rant, John realized as a team we didn’t want to lose the opportunity to film the site where the whole damn mess started. So, as pissed off and disappointed as he must have been, he turned all of the dials and knobs on his video equipment to “auto,” gave Bob Sallinger, Portland’s Audubon’s Conservation Director, a quick lesson and watched him whirr off over the Gulf of Mexico to shoot what surely would be some of PDX 2 Gulf Coast’s most important images. While a six pack of beer and the van’s A/C surely must have salved his pain, Waller could not possibly have been anything but bitter at having been left behind. Nonetheless, as Spock would opine, “the needs of the many must outweigh the needs of the few or the one.”

Similar setbacks occurred repeatedly during the trip; poor weather, missed appointments, unreturned phone calls, ignored text messages. Nonetheless, each time the PDX 2 Gulf Coast team rolled with the punches and moved on to the next interview or created another opportunity to gather as much information as possible to bring back to Portland. All of these experiences convince me that the camaraderie and friendships forged under trying conditions will stand out as the most important memory I will take away from PDX 2 Gulf Coast.

By Mike Houck, Director Urban Greenspaces Institute