Jason Rayborn stirred four packages of sugar into his iced tea, but the sugar just twirled and twirled before settling to the bottom.
“You can keep stirring for an hour. That sugar is never going to melt,” his buddy Larry Granger quipped.
No one warned Jason that he’d be hard-
pressed to find sweet tea, that Southern staple, in Denver restaurants. It’s one of the idiosyncratic surprises he’s adjusting to after fleeing New Orleans.
Last week, Jason, Larry and Larry’s fiancée, Richall Harris, talked about their transition over breakfast at the Delectable Egg in Lowry, a few blocks from where they now live. It had been a week since I followed Jason on his first day working at Wal-Mart.
We settled on that restaurant after a fruitless hunt for a Cajun breakfast spot. My colleague Ellen Sweets, who writes about food and knows the Denver restaurant scene, says such a place doesn’t exist nearby.
They said they didn’t mind, but how can they not long for a crawfish crepe or bread pudding?
The three of them had basic questions about their new city.
Where are the black people? Where are the hip-hop clubs? And why are people here so nice? (Not that people aren’t in New Orleans, but the folks they’ve encountered here have been generous and gracious.)
“People are a little too nice,” Larry said. “It makes you wonder how long it’s going to last.”
A year, maybe two. People have short memories, and most will expect you to have your life in order by then.
The three of them are on track, working and saving as much as they can. They buy food in bulk and cook in their new place – a tiny, two-bedroom loft-style apartment the three of them share in a refurbished Lowry building.
FEMA will pick up the tab for several months, then they are on their own.
Larry, 20, is unloading trucks at the Wal- Mart in Stapleton. Richall and Jason, both 19, start work this week answering phones at EchoStar Dish Network in Littleton.
But if given the opportunity to work part time and head to college full time, the three of them agreed they wish they could resume college.
Larry and Richall had taken courses at local community colleges in New Orleans. Jason had been studying at a college in Baton Rouge. But like so many poor young people who have to work, they don’t know how to navigate educational bureaucracies to get the financial aid, scholarships and grants that might be available to them.
When I first wrote about Larry I suggested one practical way people can make a difference is to give to a scholarship fund for Katrina survivors living in Colorado.
Dozens of readers called and e-mailed, saying they had their checkbook ready, but weren’t sure where to give.
It would be great if someone helped establish such a fund through an existing educational foundation. (As an employee of this newspaper I’m forbidden to take an active role – other than to write about it.)
If such a fund existed that helped these survivors pay for tuition and books and offered a stipend, Larry, Richall and Jason said they would take part-time jobs and pursue the careers they dream about.
Richall said she would work toward a career as a pharmacy technician. Larry would study software engineering and computer technology. And Jason said he would pursue a career as a screenwriter. He’s written several screenplays already, but they were destroyed in the flood.
“I have a feeling I’m going to be something,” Jason said, still stirring his iced tea.
He might, but he would have a better chance if there were others helping him.
Cindy Rodriguez’s column appears Tuesdays and Thursdays in Scene. Contact her at 303-820-1211 or crodriguez@denverpost.com.
