In my home State of Louisiana several institutions of higher education have been impacted by both Hurricanes Katrina and Rita literally dozens across the entire State.

Like all young reporters - brilliant or hopelessly incompetent - I dreamed of the glamorous life of the foreign correspondent: prowling Vienna in a Burberry trench coat speaking a dozen languages to dangerous women narrowly escaping Sardinian bandits - the usual stuff that newspaper dreams are made of.

I tried a dozen different modifications that were rejected. But they all served as a path to the final design.

I got that experience through dating dozens of men for six years after college getting an entry level magazine job at 21 working in the fiction department at Good Housekeeping and then working as a fashion editor there as well as writing many articles for the magazine.

I've hung out at dozens of playgrounds bored out of my mind with not even a look of comfort from disapproving mothers all around me. Either they think I'm a pedophile or a deadbeat dad. That's what I get for being a single dad - suspicious looks at the playground.

No memory is ever alone it's at the end of a trail of memories a dozen trails that each have their own associations.