RESURRECT DEAD ON PLANET JUPiTER

Now that I’m grown up, I still don’t have any idea what I want to be. Lots of folks hit this wall around 27. That’s why they all die. I’m not saying that to be dramatic… just as an observation. It’s that perfect age to leave in infamy. Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Kurt Cobain, Robert Johnson, even that asshole Jim Morrison, (sorry to Doors fan nuts).

What I’m trying to say is… I don’t live the life of a rock star. I missed that turn a while back. So instead of up and dying by way of alcohol, (possible murder) heroin, suicide, (possible murder) poisoning, or (what killed Jim Morrison? Did he choke on a chicken wing?) I’m sitting here, fresh off a fabulous vacation wondering not what in the hell I want to be when I grow up, but more, what do I want to do tomorrow morning when I wake up.

But then the potential hits like a shotgun blast to a juicy watermelon. I’ve gotten myself an education, a stable job and a fuckload of possible roads to take… And if I go on any further, I’ll cross that fine line where a blog becomes less universal (to a certain group of a certain age of a certain disposition) and more a journal. Where do you or I go from here?

O yeah. Here’s a series of photos from the Nevada desert. I was swarmed by gnats and ran over a snake of an indeterminate species. It was beautiful.

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Tonight marks the end of my vacation. In the morning it’s back to work. Beh.

So much of what we see of this country’s vastness appears to us only through the frame of a car window. Since the 1930’s, American photographers like Robert Frank and Walker Evans have been shooting what they see within that constantly moving image. These photos, taken last week in northern California and Nevada follow in that tradition. Some of them are frozen solid, while others blur from the car’s motion. All the images are inherently transient.

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This song is close to Liquid

No I haven’t stopped posting, I’m just going to California. I fly out tomorrow and come back next Sunday. Once there, my plans are largely incomplete. There’s the vague notion of a desert and going to one, possibly in Nevada. Or maybe to the coast… but it’s raining this week on the coast. Wherever we end up, I’ll have a camera. Maybe I’ll keep a journal and share it with you when I get back.

No, that’s sort of weird. I don’t even know some of you.

Earlier this week, 2 of my articles on the Toynbee tile phenomenon were published in the 2003 and 2004 Nova award, grand prize winning, sci-fi fanzine, ZOO NATION. ZOO NATION operates in a pre-internet format and doesn’t seem to have a website. It’s based in the UK and is the creation of Pete Young. Pete’s a tile fan who contacted me months ago after reading the articles on dovate.com. Distribution of ZOO NATION is international, but small. (around 300)

Also, one of my photos of the band Bumrunner, aka The Fire Theves, aka [tbd (that’s not a band name, it’s an acronym for ‘to be determined.’)] But anyway, in the magazine with the photo, it’s still Bumrunner and it’s called Orgivation. Orgivation is a Philly based music magazine (distribution 8,000; readership 20,000; site stats 250,000 hits/month)

The photo is the one pictured here. To read the (kick-ass) article, download a PDF of (second half of) the May issue here. Make sure to read the article to the end, because… well in case you don’t it says:

“You’re special (Bumrunner/Fire Theves)… almost as special as Matt Clowney and Steve Weinik! (bold, italics, exclamation point, mine), for taking such enchanting photos of you.”

I agree.

I was sad to see Lewis Lapham go as the editor of Harpers. The guy was only a couple months away from running a cover story on how 9-11 was an inside job and about a year and a half from claiming our world leaders are masked reptilian beings from a secret underground civilization in an alliance with a cabal of ancient demigods masquerading as demons, angels and fear harvesting aliens.

For the record, that’s a statement of respect, not a shot at his credibility. Sometimes he stepped out onto a limb. He only did so under the assumption that his audience was thoughtful enough to form an opinion of their own.

But anyway, over in the editor’s chair at Harpers, in step Ben Metcalf who opened his tenure with the brick to the face proclamation:

Am I allowed to write that I would like to hunt down George W. Bush, the president of the United States, and kill him with my bare hands?

Let me be clear that I have no wish to perform such a deed in fact, nor do I want anyone else to destroy bodily what is, at least in the technical sense, a fellow human being… I seek only to gauge what level of discourse is still acceptable in this country by asking, in the hope that I might someday participate in that discourse, whether I am free to posit that it would probably be great fun, and a boon to all mankind, if I were to slaughter the president of the United States with my bare hands.

And moving on:

…it is deemed illegal to write that one (I) would like very much to take the president’s throat in one’s (my) hands and, with the force of opposable thumb on privileged windpipe, work the life out of it.

and finally:

In place of the intitial question I might ask instead, “Am I allowed to write that I would like to kidnap George W. Bush and fly him to a prison in some far-away land where his ‘rights’ are no longer an issue, there to put a bag over his head and make him stand for hours on one leg while I defecate on his New Testament before chaining his arms to the ceiling until he dies of a heart attack, after which I will claim that he never existed?

Holy living fuck! Speechless.

I spent the afternoon at the John Heinz National Wildlife Refuge. Nestled between the airport, I-95 and a couple thousand acres of oil refineries, the space is astoundingly robust. Full of thriving plant and animal life. Just a couple notes. The blue-bird is a Barn Swallow, the long beaked bird is a Sandpiper, the large bird is a Great Blue Heron and the egg is from a Robin.

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Problem 1: The Parkway, the Art Museum Area and Fairmount are poorly served by public transportation. I know, of course that huge swaths of the city are poorly served by an organization which at its best serves poorly – but for the areas mentioned, there seems to be a solution. Which brings us to problem 2.

Problem 2: The abandoned rail line, starting at the abandoned Reading Viaduct near 11th and Vine and ending under Pennsylvania Avenue a few blocks past the art museum. Most of which sits either recessed below or completely under the street. The dead line blights everything around it.

So what’s the plan? If you haven’t figured it out yet, my idea is to build a new subway line from Broad Street and Callowhill/Spring Garden, running west to Pennsylvania Ave. and then following a parallel path to the Parkway to the Art Museum. The tunnel ends roughly at that point, but ideally I’d love to see the line continue on along the eastern edge of Fairmount Park, past Laurel Hill cemetery and through Strawberry Mansion, before meeting up with Ridge Avenue and running straight into Manayunk.

But for now, that’s just crazy. The Parkway plan is actually feasible. Half the construction is already done. It’s really just a matter of acquiring the land, the proper usage rights, squaring it with the neighbors, finding funding… and a million other impossible obstacles. But a city of the size and scale of Philadelphia should be able to pull off the impossible from time to time. And anyway, we’re not talking the big dig here, we’re talking about slapping a couple miles of track down on an existing rail bed and throwing up some stations. Besides that, a city of the size and scale of Philadelphia should boast a stellar world-class public transit system.

Philadelphia’s subway system is pathetic. The Broad street line, runs directly north/south; from the stadiums to Fern Rock station. The Market/Frankford el runs east/west, turning north as it hits the eastern edge of the city. To give you a better idea, here’s what it looks like in center city:

A subway starting at the Inquirer building on North Broad Street could take advantage of this existing abandoned and overgrown rail bed.

At 19th street, the rail line heads completely underground, running parallel to the Benjamin Franklin Parkway:

The tunnels run underneath Pennsylvania Avenue, a large and heavily trafficked road. They are stable and safe.

To serve the public and to bring Philadelphia to the level of New York, Washington D.C. London, Paris or (at least in the realm of public transportation) we need to expand our subway system. With much of the infrastructure already in place along the abandoned, recessed rail line between the Reading Viaduct and the Art Museum, a subway line here would serve a neglected and enormously important section of the city. With several world-class museums, (with more on the horizon) parades, festivals, concerts, fireworks, old condos, new condos, planned condos as well as an existing existing neighborhood along or near the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, building a new line here just makes sense.

As the title says, this boy spent the afternoon standing on top of a giant pile of dirt, hurling rocks at cars. His father was at the bottom of the dirt pile loading something (dirt?) into his pick-up. After about half an hour, 2 police cruisers arrived on the scene. My images weren’t very impressive - but that’s what photoshop can be used for. Very artsy. Texture.

I prefer this one, with the clear eye shot.

Liza prefers this one - with more sky:

Speaking of these things, just as we reached western Jersey a spectacular sunset was taking form directly in front of the car. Since I was driving, I asked Liza to get a few shots of it.

Now here’s the problem. She’s never used my camera or any digital SLR. As the sunset crested, I shouted instructions, ‘hit that button on top. ISO, turn it up! Drop the shutter speed!” Unfortunately, my instructions weren’t very good as she ended up leaving the ISO at 200 and increasing the shutter speed to 1/800th of a second. This was less than ideal.

Finally we got to the toll booth at the Ben Franklin Bridge. I gave the toll lady a 20, and set the camera as I waited for her to get my change. The sunset, which had filled the sky only a few minutes earlier was now just a faint band at the horizon. As we started over the bridge, I pointed out the passenger side window. “Shoot over there.”

With the camera on my settings, with the instruction to shoot in a certain direction, she took a picture that I really like… but who’s is it? I didn’t take the picture. It may have been my instruction, but the car was moving at 40mph and she hit the shutter. A collaboration? All I’m really saying is, this isn’t really my photo:

If my life could be represented by an object, that object would be a cage. That cage would have a steel lock, representative of work and a long green skeleton key, representative of money. I am currently sitting inside the cage, thinking about whether or not I give a shit about tying a series of ropes to myself, the cage, the locks and constructing a bridge to the key.

A lot of people try to dig their way out with a shovel made out of equity and a hand carved handle of hope. Usually people just settle into that hole, cover themselves with a mountain of debt and eventually die.

My goal is to somehow leave my symbolically trapped body, float freely through all bars, let fall any bonds and drift off into some beautiful utopia. The problem is that I’ve already rooted myself in the comforts of a full-time salary. Damn the key. Even still, I don’t love money.

But there’s also a fear of filling in all the ruts I’ve been forging and running off in a state of personal anarchy. Ruts have their predictable advantages. Most of human energy is spent furtively digging them, and then trying with all will to stay within their conventional limits.

Boring? Yes. Safe? Yes.

But this isn’t anything new. I’ve been struggling with these thoughts for years. Many people do. I will meditate on this by myself. Either that or someone please give me about 100k to help me sort things out. Thanks in advance.

In other news, I was excited this weekend when I saw a pair of Osprey hovering over the Jersey Shore at Island Beach State Park. For those of you who don’t know… the Island Beach is about 65 miles due east of Philadelphia. It’s one of the only untouched spans of mid-Atlantic coastline left. Except for the fishermen (who are allowed to drive their SUV’s onto the beach) the coast looks as it did 500 or 1000 or 5000 years ago. I think that’s pretty neat.

The Osprey were hovering above this beach, perpetually searching for the fish which make up 99% of their diet. They fly pretty low and have a 5 to 6 foot wingspan, so with a 300mm lens fully extended I got some good shots. One is up a few posts down and one will go up later this evening. I stuck the Osprey up as my desktop background here at work. I sit and stare at it.

I’ve been mute for about a week now. I’ve got a lot in my head, lots of stories and ideas and impulses, but I’ve also got a problem. The physical act of writing takes the motivation out of me. I’m running through rapidly cycling headbirths. It feels like my brain is full of insects, born, mated and dead over the course of a day. The consummation of an ideas’ life takes place in my mind and never makes its way to paper or to keyboard. I have it while I’m making dinner, or walking to the bathroom, or riding my bike to or from work… not while I’m sitting and staring at the computer screen. That’s all for now.

I took a few dozen shots of a pair of Osprey today. This is one image, cropped a little tighter. The Osprey is an amazing bird. Here’s more information.