as if they were never there...

I know that sense of loss.

When I found out that ALL of my duty stations had been closed and razed to the ground, I felt as though that part of my life had been erased from history.

Galeta Island - gone.

Hanza - gone.

Imperial Beach - gone.

On the timeline of life on Earth, all were gone in the time it took to say their names.

Gone in a phrase of air...

Regina Carter's multimedia show was based on that same concept, but hers was the loss of neighborhoods demolished in the name of highways and other construction.

I can relate to that, too.

The Lamara Apartments, where I spent my elementary school years, as well as the Nelson Apartments across the street, were all demolished in the name of a new hospital complex and doctors' offices, there to either side of Reynolds Street.

That's midtown Savannah, just a few blocks from where I live now.

The post-concert panel discussion was about lost neighborhoods throughout the States, with a Savannah emphasis on Yamacraw Village, near the touristy downtown area.

During the Q&A period afterward, most folks didn't have questions so much as memories of lost pieces of their childhood in their cities -

just like I have.

People focus on displaced brown and black, but the real issue is displaced lower-income Americans of all colors.

I think progress could be made toward saving more historic neighborhoods if the focus was more inclusive of all those displaced in the name of progress.

And how was the concert itself?

I wish I had more to say about that, but Isaac, our house manager, called me out after the first twenty minutes.

I became the Scanner Wench for the tickets and phone-borne QR codes of late-comers.

Honestly, I thought it was a moot job - but I had about seven people come through, with three of them almost 45 minutes late!

One of them heard the newly-minted NEA Jazz Master a couple of decades ago and wanted to hear the 56-year-old Regina make her violin ring out once more.

I hope she caught part of the slide show of photographs of now-gone people and homes - I very much enjoyed seeing those.