It wasn’t that long ago. Hurricane Ida hit New Orleans on August 29, 2021. The category 4 twister was the second most damaging hurricane to hit the state of New Orleans.
Ida changed Rosemary’s life forever.
She lost pretty much everything—her home, her belongings, even her treasured collection of hats she wore to Sunday church services.
Now, only pictures remain. Pictures and her faith.
“Hurricane Ida took the roof off the house and put it in the highway,” she reflected.
After a month’s long stay in the hospital, she permanently relocated to San Francisco to be closer to her grandchild and other family members.
Food was an immediate concern as she tried to settle in to her new life in the Bay Area. She is unable to stand for long, so shopping and preparing meals is difficult.
She applied for food stamps, but that process takes time and didn’t really solve the issue of how she was going to get the food.
Rosemary was in a new city, without her church family, and was unsure where her next meal was coming from. The biblical story of Job came to mind. “Job lost everything he had,” she said. She knew this was a challenge she had to face.
“I was hurried. I was grieved. I was upset.”
Rosemary relies on her deep and abiding faith to get her through difficult times. “The only man in this house is Jesus,” she often says with her contagious laugh.
She continued, “hard trials and tribulations. sometimes we have to go through…to get to the place God wants us to be.”
A relative’s Google search helped her find Meals on Wheels San Francisco, who quickly set her up with the home-delivered meals.
Her favorite meals are “everything that comes with chicken. I like that!” She also loves the cheddar potato soup and all the vegetables.
As for her delivery driver, “he is sweet. Kind as he can be.”
She misses her church family and is looking forward to getting involved locally. In the meantime, she reads her Bible and speaks to members of her church in New Orleans on occasion. “My telephone is set for prayer hour three times a day.
“My church is my life.”
