Setting Life Goals | Gazette.Net: Katrina Survivor Recalls Long, Difficult Path To Flowers Graduation
Charles H. Flowers High graduate considers Air Force
by natalie mcgill
Staff Writer
After enduring a life-altering experience in surviving Hurricane Katrina, bouncing from one home to another and watching her family go their separate ways, graduating from high school was hardly the biggest challenge in the last six years for Glenarden resident Mechelle Nance.
Nance, 18, who graduated June 2 from Springdale’s Charles H. Flowers High School, was just 12 and starting the seventh grade when flood waters from the 2005 hurricane forcing she and her family – mother and brothers, Marcus, Kevin, and Khalil – to use row boats to get to the Louisiana Superdome.
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She recalls Katrina’s devastating impact forcing her family – her mother and brothers, Marcus, Kevin and Khalil – to use row boats in hopes of finding sanctuary at the Louisiana Superdome and taking hours-long bus trips to Texas and Oklahoma before her father, Michael Hardie drove more than 1,300 miles to bring his family to Prince George’s County in September 2005.
She remembers trying to settle into a new home, new school and the quest for new friends, but the majority of the first school year was filled with answering questions from her classmates about her Katrina ordeal.
“At first it was a little nervewracking,” Mechelle Nance said. “It just made me strong so I didn’t mind telling people about it.”
She found less comfort as her family began to splinter. Her oldest brother Marcus had a child and moved in with his girlfriend. Her youngest brother, Khalil, moved in with their father in Hyattsville.
Nadir Nance commuted via bus to Annapolis each day to a receptionist job at an interior design firm. The two butt heads when her commute meant closely tracking Mechelle Nance’s location daily.
Mechelle said she didn’t like the distance among the family members and that at times she felt alone.
When Mechelle Nance decided she wanted to move in with her father in October, her mother decided to move back to New Orleans.
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