The sky was clear and calm. The nervous energy of a workday was dissolving into a stream of red lights as the cars filled the roads out of Saint Paul. It was time for the city to evacuate to the ancestral homelands in the northwoods of Minnesota for another Thanksgiving. We packed the car hurriedly and joined the stream with every reason to expect a good 4 1/2 hour drive north to Bemidji. There was no snow, no ice – but we didn’t expect there would be a couple of chainsaws.
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The musings of someone who picked it up on the streets.
The Fractal Era
“The Twentieth Century is over! We don’t have to be Modern anymore!” That’s how architecture and design critic James Howard Kunstler described his joy at the passing of time a few years ago. Modernism was dead and we all lived in a Post-Modernist word – whatever that means. So what kind of era do we live in, and why do we describe it in terms of not being the era before?
The backward-looking nature of the term “Post-Modernism” limits its usefulness. Isn’t there a more forward-looking term? I think the answer lies deep within the question itself, referring back to the need for any kind of handle at all. That’s why I’ve taken to calling our time the Fractal Era.
More Perfect Union: Neighborhood
Saint Paul Police Chief Harrington told the story as the featured speaker for the Fort Road Federation Annual Meeting. Two police officers went to a house where a concerned neighbors called about a woman at the front door shouting something in Hmong. Not knowing what was up, they proceeded carefully as she kept shouting the same thing, earnestly, over and over. The were nearly to the door when another officer drove up, one who heard the call and knew that his Hmong heritage could be useful in that neighborhood. He knew what was going on at once. “She’s yelling ‘gun’!” he called to the officers, who immediately took cover. The man with the weapon inside later killed himself, but quick action saved the lives of two cops that day.
More Perfect Union: Internet
We live in a time when just about every national institution is experiencing difficulties or is right out failing. There are many reasons why this is happening, but much of it boils down to two basic forces: dramatic over-reaching and the influence of the Internet. I’ll leave the hubris of our financial sector to Shakespeare, since he made a living out of depicting it well, but the Internet is the opportunity and challenge of our time. There’s little doubt it will redefine what “media” is, and along with that the bits and pieces of a culture which are delivered by a medium.
More Perfect Union: Music
You’re at a game, crammed into the seats like everyone else. It could be any of the big sports, but you can predict it especially easily when it’s hockey. At the first break in the action the wailing guitars crank up in a way that bring the image of a hand rolling the knob over hard. You sing along, or rather shout along, to the only word that goes along with it – “Hey!” Yes, it’s Rock & Roll (Part 2) by Gary Glitter, but neither you nor nearly anyone knows that. What you do know is that this is one of those songs that is part of a good time at the game, all as part of the price of admission.
Barataria - The work of Erik Hare 