Thursday, November 27, 2003

visual stimulation

A little bleary from the beaujoulais and gallinaceous tryptophan?  Or from that sentence you just read?  Here’s a few comfortably easy-to-understand images that will ease you into restful digestive slumbers.  Or they might infuriate you and drive you into an unreasoning rage.  Hard to tell from here.

This one was taken at the edge of the Grand Canyon around 2001.  I guess that’s all there is to say about it.

This one was taken in 1982 of one of my freshman roommates, as he stared in a deep and darkening funk out my window on the 10th floor of our 25 story dorm.

This one is a door hinge in Mendocino; I took it around 1995 on an autumn sunset.  I don’t know why I love this photo so much but it seems to have a lot to say, though I’m not sure I often hear much of it. 

Now a quick seasonal essay, and then to cook the green bean casserole.  Mine is, by the way, the best.  I’ll catch you all on the flip side.

The Feast

It’s not that it snuck up on me, I’ve been watching that pumpkin pie on the horizon getting bigger and closer every day with slavering anticipation.  But this past few days at work have been a lot more intense than I had planned on them being, and my weekend was full and busy and wonderfully pleasant but not so productive… and mom’s in town staying with us through sunday… so I had to take off work yesterday and do floor and walls and trash and beds and the fridge and windows and cabinets and entryway and a few other messy items.... and that barely left time for grocery shopping and no time at all for cooking… and I still haven’t made time for a “thankfulness rumination.”

I could make the cynic’s choice and use this post as an opportunity to harrangue what I’m not thankful for.  Many wise commentators, some with deep sonorous voices, have been doing the same this year.  But I figure that I dedicate most days of the year to complaining about crap I can’t do a damn thing about.  Bad ideas, bad execution, bad intentions, bad music.  Here’s one chance to put aside my alum and admit, even if only grudgingly, that the world has something good to offer. 

Today started with my getting an email from my dear friend daBomb, among the longest acquaintences in my life and among the most precious.  It was a quick flash animation telling me she was grateful for me.  For me?  My dear, I’m grateful right back at you for you.  For a lifetime of friendship, hours of wise counsel, years of uproarious laughter, and just for being so darn cute. 

And that puts me on track to think of a lot of stuff that I’m thankful for.  So much, it would likely be pretty boring to read a recitation of it.  I’ve had an exceptional year, the sort I’d figured I was done having years ago.  With this much to feel good about, a list would be too banal to reflect even a part of the thankfulness I feel. 

So instead I’ll relate a short exchange between my dad and myself.  I just got invited to offer a toast at his upcoming septidecimal birthday party, and I knew right away that my toast would have to include this story.  It’s one of the first conversations I ever remember having.  I was in the back seat of our car, and he was in the front, driving me to my nursery school on a bright morning.  I was just starting to get actively curious and I remember asking, “is it better to be a kid or a grownup?” Dad gave a thoughtful pause and answered, “Kids think it’s better to be grownup, and grownups think it’s better to be a kid.  The thing that’s best of all is to be who you are.  If you’re a kid, be a kid and enjoy it.  If you’re not, be who you are and have fun with it.  If you think it’s better to be something else, you won’t even be what you are.”

Here’s to all of us having a day in which we are all ourselves, and enjoy it till we fall asleep.

Wednesday, November 26, 2003

I got your dots right here

I’d like to think we’re a “visually-impaired sensitive” household.  Kel works full-time with the blind, and is going for a masters in the field.  I used to do a little volunteer work at the Lighthouse, an organization that helps the blind.  Plus, we got a copy of Spirit of the Century.  (Which completely rocks.  Someone swiped it from us.  Gotta replace it.  Great album.) Even I - I, myself - wear eyeglasses.  So we’re a sensitive crew here at Greater Huttsville when it comes to ocuclar acuity. That’s why I feel comfortable making the following observation about braille.

Braille is an alphabet made of patterns of raised dots and is read through the sense of touch.  The Lighthouse has its name (I assume) plastered across its stucco facade down at Civic Center in three-foot-wide braille dots.  That wasn’t the first place I saw braille where it usually isn’t.  I’ve grown used to seeing it on elevators, ATM machines, in museums - places where people often have to respond to visual cues.  I’m usually happy to see braille anywhere it shows up.  It’s an important tool for independence and mobility and I support its promulgation. 

But on top of a building, as a sort of dentil frieze for the visually impaired?  What a world! 

And then I started noticing braille all sorts of strange places I’d not have expected it to appear.  Places where, as far as I can tell, it’s not doing anybody any good.  Or it’s been installed so that it’s effectively invisible to the blind, or in places a blind person just doesn’t need to look for instructions.  Some of the stranger options I’ve enjoyed have included braille at drive-through windows (for the visually impaired motorists among us, and they are legion) and on the emergency exit instructions on a 777; I think my current favorite was a big painted wall sign with two-foot-tall letters and nice shiny braille dots painted onto the glossy wall underneath.  These dots are bigger than a handsbreadth, and I can’t imagine how the blind would know even to feel for them, much less be able to read their flat surfaces.  But that’s the magic, isn’t it.  That’s why people are lining up to put braille everywhere.  It’s just fun.  It’s political sensitivity meets pop art. 

Anyway that’s the only explanation I can come up with for the bizarre abuses of braille that seem to be proliferating in our modern world.  And regular readers know that there’s nothing like a bizarre abuse to get my creative juices flowing, so here are a few other ideas for places to use braille:

Auto dashboards
Movie screens
Petting zoos (I envision baby animals with big ol’ braille dots glued on)
Peep shows
The beach
Firearms

I also think that chirping signal some intersections have to let the blind know when its safe to cross, should basically follow me around.  We could all stay out of a lot of trouble that way.