Imagine that you’re in an elevator when the power goes out. The systems that made it possible for you to easily travel between floors without even being aware of them are suddenly very obvious by their absence. You’re trapped – all by things you never even bothered to notice were all around you all the time. All you can hope is that these systems are re-started before you starve to death. Sound familiar? It’s how James Burke opened up his landmark BBC series Connections in 1978. This series challenged us all to look at the way our world was constructed a bit differently, a bit less at the contributions of one person and more at the connections that made it all possible.
Monthly Archives: May 2009
Oakland Cemetery
The scraggly oak trees form a tall ceiling that shades the entire drive. It’s not that a view of the sun and sky would be unpleasant on this warm day of early spring, but it’s nice to have it blocked all the same. The appropriate view of the eternal isn’t blue and bright, but sheltered close to the ground. The rows of marble and granite dazzled by bright flowers that give it a sense of redemption, but the 5 MPH speed limit and gentle wave from each passerby that gives it grace.
This is Oakland Cemetery, Saint Paul’s municipal cemetery, founded in 1853.
Be Not Afraid
Across the globe, May Day is Worker’s Day, a celebration of Labor forged in what may well be the first Big Idea that transcended national boundaries. In the USofA, we made sure our Labor Day was insulated by all of summer from this idea because it was so troublesome. Marxism, Communism, and all of the various isms that make up this Big Idea have their day everywhere but here. For all of the trouble they gave us this seems almost quaint in today’s world.
Barataria - The work of Erik Hare 