The evacuation gets complicated

Today's relocation of about 4,000 evacuees from the Astrodome and Houston's other giant shelters to two Galveston-based cruise ships has been delayed because shelter residents don't want to go. Volunteers trying to fill buses bound for Kentucky also found few takers.

"Some of these people are still looking for their families," said Andrew Biar, a spokesman for the Federal Emergency Management Agency. "They don't want to go. They feel safe here."

"The dome is home for them," said Lt. Joe Leonard of the U.S. Coast Guard and area commander for the Houston shelters. "For residents, another immediate relocation is simply too much, too soon."

Some residents prefer to focus on finding family memers while others want more time to explore options for getting on with their lives. All are struggling to comprehend the dramatic changes that have happened to them in less than a week.

"We realize they need more time to recover emotionally before making this challenging housing transition," Leonard said. "We're listening and giving them more time to heal."

This is perfectly understandable, and not really even a surprise. Shock, grief, despair, depression: these people will go through a lot in the next few days. Already they are beginning to identify with their caregivers, imagining (sadly, no) that all of Houston will provide care for them for some time to come. Which is not to be critical of those who now think of Houston has home; but this is going to be a very complicated process, and these people are not prisoners or wards of the state. They are adults; they are human beings. They can make choices.

But it means the compassion of the volunteers is going to wear thin even faster. By which I don't mean it should; just that it will. The transition from homeless in the Astrodome to returning to a home, is going to a delicate one for some. But then, look around your own home, and imagine losing everything: your glasses, maybe; your contact lens case; your shoes; your clothes; the small items in your bedroom. You stand in the world with precisely nothing, even less than you may have had in New Orleans or Slidell or Gulfport. Moving on from zero, is going to take awhile.

And we have to honor their wishes:

Another issue in filling the Katrina Caravan buses is that transportation and housing offered by groups in the North or Midwest are not as attractive to Louisiana residents as destinations farther south, Stanton said.

"What we need are companies to donate buses and let us pick the routes, to run the buses where people need to go," she said.