During the time author Pauline Leonard was writing this paper, Hurricane Katrina thrust itself upon the Gulf Coast, including many communities in southeast Louisiana. In the wake of the storm, reports emerged of the devastation, loss of life and destruction to property. Writing about personal experiences with developing and implementing educational programs in one university in North Louisiana somehow seemed unimportant in the shadow of this catastrophe, with over a million people evacuated from their homes and communities. It made the issues that Leonard had been writing about seem diminutive, perhaps even trite. As she continued to write, in the context of this unfolding human tragedy, she began to realize more fully the importance of not only action, but of reflective action in one's endeavors. While her deliberations were interrupted by Hurricane Katrina and her attention took a turn toward the more immediate and urgent matters of doing what could be done to help, she eventually returned to her writing with increased fervor in the knowledge and confirmation that such matters are not trite, nor self indulgent. She began to realize more fully the importance of not only action but of reflective action in educational endeavors. She began to ask herself: How can I be sure that my actions as a professor in an institution of higher learning are helping to create a better, more just, more caring equitable society? In this article, Leonard writes that the necessity of responding to an urgent situation through immediate actions does not preclude the need for educators to continue to be philosophical and to consider and reconsider the values, the valuation processes of education administrators, and the influence of those values on their actions in the pursuit of a morally authentic life. In fact, the two are indeed related. Leonard closes the article by sharing her observation that achieving authenticity also requires an understanding that there is much to be learned as administrative educators navigate the road of authenticity, particularly as they attempt to make sense of the interruptions encountered along the way, from the casual to the catastrophic.