Lost & Found

It was going to come to this: I'm looking at Google Maps, with its customary grid and satellite views. Now, there's a new feature called "street view."

There is my house, as clear as it gets here on the clearest of days. And, out front, is that...? Yes, that is my car, parked in front. I showed this to the kids, and Julia (8) was shocked.

"Wait, Dad, if I run out front will we be able to see me?"

Not quite yet, but as this technology unfolds, it's easy to imagine a future time when we will be able to zoom in anywhere, in real time, and see anything, or anybody.

This, of course, is beyond spooky -- a word carefully chosen, for until recently only spooks had access to this kind of imagery. Slowly but surely, however, technologies developed by U.S. military intelligence agencies (like the super-secret NRO), are migrating into the commercial sphere.

What we get, of course (and pardon my gross reference here) is only "sloppy seconds." We can be assured that if I can access a mapping software program and drill down to look at a particular building on a certain street and see what car is parked there, that the spooks are so far ahead of us that this stuff is now considered child's play.

What do I think U.S. surveillance technology is capable of today? It's just a hunch, but with advanced Infrared imaging, GPS, listening technologies, interlinked databases, face recognition, voice recognition, and global mapping technologies, among many others, I strongly suspect there are rooms where analysts watch anybody "of interest" in real time, day after day, and night after night.

Until the order comes to take them out.

I assume that the caves of Tora Bora, for example, can be constantly monitored, night and day, in order to determine who comes and who goes. It's already trivial to monitor any cell phone conversation anywhere in the world. It won't be long before a "person of interest" will not be able to move without triggering an electronic signal to those who want to track his/her actions.

I'm hardly an expert in surveillance technology, although ~28 years ago, with John Markoff and Michael Singer, I co-wrote a long series about the coming age of electronic snooping. I remember the demos that proud entrepreneurs in that era's Silicon Valley showed us -- of tiny microphones that could pick up conversations through glass windows, for example -- and wondering how much longer our traditional (American) sense of privacy could possibly survive.

You might think, as an investigative reporter, that I would have welcomed the opportunity to snoop on the bad guys we were following. But quite honestly, this aspect of the technological revolution sickened me. I grew up in a time and a place where I could run off through the cornfields and the woods and do whatever I wanted to do, without fear that anyone would catch me at it.

Not that I was doing anything all that scandalous, mind you, mainly inventing a world of interconnected trails and circles in the corn, and a world of tracking rabbits in the wood. Maybe I placed a penny or two on the train tracks in the hope that the daily train might yield me a mangled souvenir; and quite possibly I practiced shooting bottles perched on rocks with my trusty 16-gauge shotgun.

Once or twice I might have smoked a cigarette (yuck, hated it) or sucked on my own corncob pipe. Maybe, if I wandered to where they was a waterhole, I might have gone skinny-dipping. It's conceivable, when I was a bit older, that I smoked some dope or made love to my girlfriend, somewhere there, out in the open, someplace far away, long ago, but I really don't remember now.

But, whatever I may or may not have done, here, there, or anywhere, I'm quite sure I felt safe that no one could see me doing it or not doing it, comprende?.

Now think about our brave new world. If I am right, and invasive technologies have reached the point they logically should have, an intelligent agent could conceivably look right through your walls, purportedly to make sure you were not indulging in some sort of nefarious activity deemed to be against the interests of the Empire; oops, sorry, the nation.

The land of the free and the home of the brave. The place that celebrates the rugged individualist, unless of course, he turns out to be gay. (Reference: Brokeback Mountain.)

I believe we may be entering an era where most violent crimes may be able to be solved. It seems odd, in fact, that in high-murder areas like Newark or Oakland, the police still do not have videos of most of the street killings that occur, after all, outside, often in full daylight, on the same corners again and again.

Hell, maybe if I mastered Google Maps, I could solve these endless killings! Google's corporate philosophy is to do no harm. How about doing some good? That's my plea to Google. You guys are taking over the technology world you operate in. It's time you started asking how you might turn your power to good.

Believe me, those of us stuck out here in the physical reality of crime, poverty, violence and despair need you!

***




My own love-hate relationship with technology could probably not be better captured than in the joy I feel when introducing my children to seemingly miraculous developments of a positive nature. Thus, tonight, celebrating their oldest sister's birthday, my youngest children had their first experience on Skype.

In case this service has somehow eluded you, listen up. You can talk to anyone, anywhere in the world, for as long as you wish, for free. Simply download Skype and start talking.

I sound like an advertisement. But at this point I don't even have any long-distance telephone service, and my cell phone provider seems to find new ways to screw me whenever I talk to somebody in a distant place on that unit.

But, with Skype, my three youngest and I talked to my oldest in Chile (and briefly, to my second oldest, in Portland, via conference calling) for a long time and it cost absolutely nothing.

***

The photo at the top of this post is an enigma. It is an earring, and it looks to have been lost some time ago. Despite my weak photographic skills, this item looks better in my photo than in reality.

For some reason I love this photo. Maybe because I want to know its story. Who lost this earring here and when and why? Sharp-eyed Julia found it on our property on Memorial Day. I've asked some of the usual suspects, but so far its owner remains mysterious.

I would love to reconnect it with its rightful owner.

After all, I have the photograph, and in this new digital world of ours, that never need be lost, no matter what. That's where the art resides. What is lacking is the backstory...


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Happy Birthday, Baby

Somewhere, in storage, there is a slide of my little girl painting this rainbow when she was in nursey school. The print hangs in my kitchen; I look at it every day, and think of that young artist.
Here she is, with Loic. They will be married here, in San Francisco on July 21st (my niece Cara's birthday), and also, in Nice, on August 4th (on what would have been my mother's 92nd birthday). Our family can claim many dates for such joyful events.
When it comes to big sisters, there cannot possibly ever have been a better one. Although bossy, she always has had a huge heart, a generosity of spirit that I wish we all could possess, and a protectiveness that meant no one could mess with her younger siblings.What can I say? She was a wild, emotional child who scared us hallf to death with her intensity.
With her friend Prentice, there on Ashbury Street where they both grew up, we had many sweet photo ops.
Me and my first born.
With her little brother, Peter.

With her Mom.

First, Laila, Sarah, and Peter in their teens. Second, My oldest child and me.
My Michigan Mafia buddy Frank Viviano's brother, Sam, sketched this rendition of the young Laila in La Victoria.

Happy Birthday, Laila!

Boys v. Girls

Julia's new sandals, secured after our hard-fought shopping trip. Notice the toe ring.

***

Some days, the logistical aspect of single parenting bewilders me. Other days, my growing absent-mindedness disturbs me.

Today, both combined to expose the sad truth that I am over-extended. Nevertheless, despite one major failure, it is a good day and a nice night, despite the huge, unwanted (by me) plastic machine gun that now sits in my flat.

Losing your Internet access can be quasi-traumatic these days; and for me, the past few days have been just that: quasi-traumatic. It wasn't as bad as it could have been, thanks to a free Internet cafe Progressive Grounds nearby.

Actually, that link takes you to the original coffee house of the same name, on Bernal Heights, but a second one, less well-known, sits at the corner of 21st Street and Bryant, just around the corner from me.

Today was a holiday in the U.S. -- Memorial Day, when we honor the many who have died wearing our military uniforms all over the world. Did you happen to see Doonesbury yesterday. Gary Trudeau devoted the entire strip to the names of our recently dead young soldiers, men and women, thanks to the Bush Administration's ill-conceived war in Iraq.

It's fascinating that a mere list of names can be a political statement. Though I have not yet checked, I would not be surprised if some newspapers refused to print the strip, but then again, why? What exactly does such a list mean, politically?

***

The cable-modem guy came by today, replaced two ancient splitters (one outside, one in) and my Internet connectivity seems to be back at a better level than I've had for a long, long time. My oldest son also came by today, and helped me hook up the printer to my computer and secure my wireless modem with a new password.

Peter has been helping me with technology since he was about eight. Unlike me, he has a perfectly logical mind, plus a lot more, allowing him to think through and trouble-shoot software solutions that elude me. By contrast with my boy, I am impetuous, impatient, illogical, and given to bouts of extreme helplessness. For years, I have relied on his visits to help me get my systems back in order.

He always comes through.



Arriving as he did this afternoon, taking a break, in fact, from the very same Progressive Grounds plugged earlier, Peter found himself challenged to a basketball game by two of the fiercest little competitors you'd ever wish to face: Julia and Marisol.

It was boys against girls. Two six-footers, one extremely athletic, one previously athletic, against two four-footers who talk constantly and employ an unusual defensive strategy -- they grab on and don't let go.

Despite this smothering defense, the "boys" made a credible showing, probably more or less playing to an even score, though no one was keeping it.

***

My sweet housemate returned from her three-week vacation in Mexico and remembered my one request -- that she bring me a piece of seaglass. Turns out there wasn't much there, but she grabbed the one she saw and brought it to me. She looks so tanned and relaxed and pretty; it reminds me how wonderful vacations in the tropics can be.

It's been a while.

***

As part of today's logistical challenges, I found myself waiting outside the Glen Park Bart station for 20 minutes this evening. With no book to read, I finally cracked the owner's manual for my car. This vehicle is three-and-a-half years old, and has over 55,000 miles on it, and except for one Burning Man expedition, they've been pretty much all put on by me.

But tonight, May 28th, for the first time since I got it, my car's dashboard displays the proper time! It's always been roughly two hours off and I could not figure out how to fix that. Thanks to having to wait at a strange locale with nothing else to do, I discovered my car has some sort of technology called DMS, which allows me to align my car clock with some of the universal resources out there, courtesy, I suppose of GPS.





Yesterday, at Carnaval, my 12-year-old son, Aidan, put on a show at the NBA basketball exhibit. He's the best basketball player in our extended family since my cousin, Ed Ross, who was all-state at Royal Oak Dondero in the early '60e. I'll never forget one game I saw, where Eddie has 17 by halftime and went on to score 27, leading his team to a rout.

Aidan's got a ways to go to get to that level, but he's got the pure talent, IMHO, if he wants to go there.

***



I have no idea why I took this picture, except that it is what Julia and I had for breakfast, way back there this morning, now so long ago...

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Carnaval, Part Two

Yesterday, in pictures.

Carnaval

I have a ton of photos from today's street party but I've lost my Internet connection, and am online only courtesy of a hack that I surprised myself by being able to accomplish. I'll have to keep this brief, and just post some representative photos for now, because I may lose this tenuous connection at any minute.

It was cloudy all day in the Mission. Carnaval is a lot of things, but one of its signature aspects, much like beaches in Tahiti, are lots of semi-naked women. There also are lots of photographers with zoom lens on their cameras. Funny, but they all seemed to be men.

In San Francisco, exhibitionism is not limited to any one gender. The Gay Pride parade next month will have more semi-naked men than women, if past parades are any guide. There are also a lot of photographers there, and funny, almost all of them seem to be men.

This post, then, is about voyeurism, which seems to be mainly a male predilection. True to form, and loyal to my gender, I seem to always spot an attractive woman in any crowd; when it's a party like today's, such shots are all too easy.

I stand guilty as charged.

***

However, I've got another 20 photos I will upload when I am confident in my bandwidth. Many of these tell other stories -- the cultural diversity of those who have immigrated to this neighborhood. This festival combines the sensuality of Brazil with the colors of Guatemala and the long-term dominance in this area of Mexico. Many other ethnicities and races also were represented. It was striking, for instance, how many African-Americans participated, here in the city with such a small black population, perhaps six percent.

There also were the corporate "sponsors"-- Advil, and the NBA, among others.

And then there was the crowd, many of who dressed up for the occasion. By late afternoon, the air was redolent with marijuana and cerveza, so I exited the scene.

Tonight, my face feels hot. Oh yeah, cloudy skies don't block UV radiation, so I got a bit of sunburn out there today.

More photos to follow, when I can get them up...

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Question conventional wisdom (which condones authority)

Given that this is Carnaval weekend here in The Mission, there have been loudspeakers booming over on Harrison Street all day. It's a cold, windy, foggy day, so the sounds of the partying race here on the prevailing westerly wind, so much so that it seems like the bands are in our backyard.

The parade isn't until tomorrow, and at this hour, the revelers are traipsing home, little groups of nomads in colorful dress, with balloons and banners. No half-naked girls so far this year, no doubt due to the weather, but I'll let you know if, as usually is the case, any appear.

***

Dylan's Medieval history project is finally underway, as one of the books arrived that the great Norman Birnbaum led us to: 1066:The Year of the Conquest. From the minute he cracked it open, Dylan was hooked, reading out facts to me about the sparsely settled England of a millennium ago, where London had only a few thousand citizens and everyone else lived in villages where (as Dylan explained to me) "a man knew every other person, every animal, and even every tree!"

It was the concept of knowing every tree that fascinated my youngest son, who, of course, has grown up in a fairly big city, by our standards. Most people do not appreciate how small San Francisco actually is, compared to the massive metropoli of our time. Only around 750,000 people, max, live here, and that total hasn't changed much, because we don't have anywhere to expand into.

***

I am watching (on TV) the San Francisco Giants play baseball again tonight. The great slugger Barry Bonds has been in a long slump, and columnists have been speculating that maybe he is finally done. Old sluggers tend to fade suddenly, and Bonds is old. After a terrific start, that catapulted him to the Nation al League lead in homeruns (11), Bonds has stayed frozen at that number for oh so long now.

As you probably know, if your heart has been beating these past few years, Barry Bonds is the one baseball star people in America love to hate. There are lots of purported reasons: He's been perceived as aloof, arrogant, and unavailable by the corps of sportswriters who regard their access as an entitlement that any star must honor.

But Bonds is a complicated case. His father, Bobby Bonds, was a fantastic baseball player, also with the Giants. He came up in the early years of the color line being breached, so he endured many insults and perceived insults, in the tradition of American-style racism.

When his career ended, he became an alcoholic, bitter and angry.

His son Barry has effected his father's revenge. No one in history has ever been a better hitter than Bonds. But, just has been always the case, athletes use whatever boost might be available to gain a competitive advantage.

In Bonds' era, it is steroids -- horrible drugs that will probably doom all the athletes who used them to an early death.

The evidence is that many, many players used steroids, including Bonds. But the anger of a culture is directed only at Bonds. This particular culture is one composed of old white men, the only people who really care about the supposed statistical purity of the game.

Forget purity. Baseball players of all eras have done whatever they could to be great. The history of the game is replete with scandals.

The problem with blaming Bonds is that he has been such a fearsome hitter for so long that those who hate him overlook a factor that changes the equation: Bonds has been walked more often than any player in history, even Babe Ruth. No one has ever been so fearsome that opposing teams walk him intentionally at the rate Bonds is walked.

Thus, all those walks have neutralized whatever supposed advantage he has gained through drugs. That is how historians of the game will evaluate Bonds' performance. When he finally hits his 22nd HR this season (he is halfway there already), he'll own the most famous record in sports, the all time homerun record.

I hope I am at the park when Bonds does it.

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We

First off, at the end of this post, I want to republish some of the recent amazing comments contributed by my new friend, Mesmacat, in Australia. Regular visitors know I very rarely do this, because what the webheads like to call the "real estate" herein is mainly devoted to my memoir-in-progress.

But, every now and again, a new person shows up with such remarkable insights, firing off of what I have posted that he or she elevates what I am trying to do here to another level.

That is how it is with Mesmacet. His reflections add much more heft and literary sensibility to my posts, so my other readers deserve to see his writings. If you click back through recent posts, you will see many such comments, each as wonderful as its predecessor.

I wish I could figure out how to juxtapose my posts with his comments, as a sort of dialogue that reveals new layers of meaning beyond what I could ever accomplish on my own.

I am truly grateful to Mesmacet, for participating in this way. And I will anew encourage anyone else who feels like it to join the conversation here. Forget the memoir; I would be thrilled if this blog turned into a community of people discussing themes of mutual interest.

In other words, in '60s lingo, "let's do this altogether."



To inspire your inner artist, here is "an old Lamborghini" by Dylan. I think he was nine when he drew this.



I've been caring for my housemate's plants while she frolics on the beaches of Mexico, celebrating her 40th birthday. This one seems to enjoy my care.



Here we are, back to Dylan's car series. What I love about this van is its relationship with the stoplight.

A new haiku:

For every car
A stop light

By David-San, 2007



Here in the region with the richest agricultural bounty on earth, all kinds of good things are flowing into our markets.



Ever think you can't write? Have nothing to say?

I've taught writing in various venues since I was 22. I still have not met the person with nothing to say, no story to tell. But I have met many who lack confidence in their ability to write.

Much of this, I fear, is the natural result of a society that alternatively ignores and over-values its writers. Sure, some have more pure writing "talent" than others. But, everybody can write, whether they realize it or not.

I can't wait to locate, scan and publish my grandmother's partial memoir here; and perhaps parts of my father's hand-written, unfinished novel. Neither would have ever considered themselves "writers," yet both were capable of weaving a story with words that were uniquely their own.

We all have our "voice." In fact, we have at least two voices. Our speaking voice, which can grow weak with age. Our writing voice, which transcends age.

Those who know sign language, or are able to convey stories with their bodies, through dance and other forms, have the gift of a physical voice, not reliant on words.

Actually, there are many other voices residing within us. The various media forms -- drawing, painting, photography, film-making, jewelry-making, sculpture, performance pieces, standup comedy, and (to my mind) the most powerful of all -- music -- all convey separate channels for releasing the individual voice.

(At this point, I have to explain the above photo was a mistake, the result of my finger pressing the shoot button when I meant to press the off button. Something about the result is strangely compelling, to me. My point is that we all can create some form of "art" almost by accident, or even entirely by accident, if we just recognize it when it happens.)

The other night, on YouTube, I was indulging one of my favorite passions -- gathering clips of live performances from musicians I adore. On this occasion, I was seeking great renditions of Amazing Grace, the ultimate gospel composed, ironically, by a man who participated in the slave trade until he saw the light, and grasped the power of a force that could "save a wretch like me."

I am not so unreligious that I do not appreciate the power of this message. At my father's burial, at Rolling Hills in summer, 1999, I held my daughter Sarah, a beautiful singer, as we all sang the song of loss, faith, salvation, and redemption in honor of my father's life.

I found one version, by Mahalia Jackson, but failed to locate another, by Marion Brown, that is my all-time favorite.



It occurred to me last night that I have been looking at this ceiling fan for nearly four years now, but never captured it on film.

***
Mesmacat has left a new comment on your post "The Hearts of Men":

David, I was looking at another post, where you mentioned the idea of a generation able to see its own demise. I wrote a little off line, in response to that, at first, but the thoughts have not yet found their mark. They may not, these are big questions and I do not expect necessarily always to find some satisfying responses to them, as I grapple with the ideas they inspire.

Nevertheless, I am glad for the opportunity to engage with these notions. It is something I enjoy about the time I spend here; I encounter an idea or feeling you have opened out in your own way, through your own curiosity, and I can build on that. It is in my own way of course, but by and large with some sense of shared sentiment or hopefully shared respect for the core of the issue.

It creates the potential that an online body of writing, joined with the commentary of others, can merge into a form of interactive creativity very different from simply writing in your own space for yourself. It also certainly helps that you cover so much ground, with so many poignant sensibilities therein, planted and cultivated with care.

Unlike my own journal, which is a vast collection of drafts and sometimes half finished thoughts – a writer’s journal, complete with ink spots and ramblings - this is a space where I feel better for only posting what I am ready to post, with a sense of the best refined thoughts of a time. They may not be complete, but they are not tumbled on to the page for the sake of releasing a writer’s creative tensions. Your posts are are polished, self-realized and elegant to a point I would like to respond to in kind, rather than according to the dictates of my own blog project.

Somehow, writing in response to this post, it was easier to make a proper beginning on a path to examining what I feel about questions of that generation that sees its own end.

The following is what this post made me feel, while still considering my response to the other post:


I battle with this too. I suspect many thinking, sensitive people do, and I hope at least to be one of those, or at least scrape in somewhere among them, after my many fits and starts of action and reaction, grand visions and humbled discoveries. And boy, have there been a few of those. And probably many more to come, no matter how often I think I have found the answer, and can coast on rosy wheels, only to falter on the bumps and pot holes I little see along the road, in my eagerness for enjoying a path that is great for my latest brand of skates to roll on.

David, I guess you have worn more skates, in more styles, and learnt from more knocks that I have. But I have had a good few in my time.

The question sometimes seems to me to be: how do we get to love, if we think too much, want too much or fear not little enough? How do we grow towards love? Some just feel it; some are there already. Children are in some ways, but they have not yet discovered how to find it when it is not given to them without question or perseverance, or indeed, only lies after a journey through a landscape of disappointment.

Yes, there are grown ups who love as innocently and fully sometimes as children. But they are but some among many that make up the world; not all are as evolved in their sensitivity or the scope of their hearts from the starting line or not a long way past it.

A great number of us have to find love, and find it through struggle, difficulty and encounters with the limitations of our less than admirable greeds and misguided passions.

The dog eat dog world of literal survival, the egg breaking, the lessons learned from dangerous over confidence or too much self doubt, the hurt, pain, depression and mania. They are part of the world, no doubt. They are dynamics of creativity and discovery in a growing consciousness, perhaps more for young men, than young women, but probably in parallel ways, are equivalent maturity processes within different modes of feeling and perception. No one wants them at the time, but working through them certainly makes love mean something, makes love real, not imagined or too closely associated with wants, not needs - with covetousness, not generosity.

Taking advantage of the good fortune we are sometimes showered with before we recognize it – the young in our society seldom seem to do this unless they are lucky, or precociously gifted or spectacularly well trained by the wise, and receptive to\o them. Can we expect from our collective adult selves, so young really in the scope of what it means to be a global society, with so many new toys, and so much new power, to do any better?

If we are to survive, we are going to have to succeed, however, in finding a way to maturity, to moving on from our egoistical fascinations. We have to grow up as a civilization. Our survival depends on it, as does in many ways the survival of a young person depend on finding maturity after the experiments of youth.

It is a bit more complicated with a global society with vast and intricate forces and temptations, than with a single individual, no doubt. Especially given that society is young in many ways, but also quite old in others. We blind ourselves to the consequences of our actions as well, as we blind ourselves to the lessons of history.

As a civilization we are both old and young at once. We can err in both directions. As a civilization we do not ever confront death and the gradual change of our body leading to it, at least not yet. We keep on moving on, learning some things, but also in a kind of eternal youth of the optimism of our own grand plans for a future we have not yet had to come to terms with.

It is this question of forward motion without true apprehension of the consequences, coupled with a constant effort to erase the troubling lesions of history that leads me on to further thoughts about the generation that can see its own demise. Hopefully they will settle into place.

***

Mesmacat has left a new comment on your post "Attachments\":

I think the coin is safe in your hands. The person who might tell you a story worth you parting with it, I suspect might also be a person who has no desire or need for it.

Greed seems a poor inspiration for true tales that move us. I certainly like the look of it too much to make an attempt :)

I guess it might be a story about finding treasure, and a coin seen in the light of its journey is something more than its face value. Stories as treasures, and treasures as stories, what a web you have woven there, David LOL.

When I read your post I was reminded of a story I read a long time ago, I can hardly remember what or by who, about a coin that was one of those used to pay Judas to betray Christ. It caused unsettling fortunes for those whose hands it passed into. I guess that Pirates of the Caribbean films probably play on a similar idea.

I can quite relate to your pondering on how many hands it’s passed through. But I also wonder how long before coins themselves vanish from the lives of some nations.

I guess coins derived originally from the value of certain units of precious metals. And even when coins no longer reflected their value in material, it still makes sense to hold something that is equivalent in value to another thing.

How many things so vital to survival are moving towards being so abstract.

On another note, a memory from my own life. Coins as a child were obviously a means to desired things. But also they were objects of fun.

I can recall playing at the seaside on a game that paid you more coins if you rolled your first down a shoot in such a way that the coin fell exactly between the edges of a stripped surface.

Another machine was an ever-moving contraption of shifting ledges, a waterfall awaiting the signal to flow, that showered coppers and sometimes silvers if you dropped it in the right spot.

Some of these machines still exist. They are among the best indications of dicey, risk-laden investment I can think of. But the potential thrill of clatter of won coins is difficult to ignore.

***

Mesmacat has left a new comment on your post "Traveler's Tales":

Beautiful artifacts. I am sorry to hear about the loss of your own collection from your travels.

I have always been entranced by the way that the artifacts a civilization produces, resonate with its character:
Style like a wavelength of experience, like a pattern you can almost taste. I had an experience once that suggested to me almost as though the elements of language, style and shaping of the land express some kind of hidden coefficient. How it would I have no idea, but there is something so compelling about the way that so many aspects of a time and place fit together.

The artifacts can be quite different, they can have many different functions, but they belong together. In a sense they are also dots you can join together with your imagination to apprehend something of people either a long way away, or far back in time.

I don't know if you know the Borges story Tlon Uqbar Orbis Tertius - about a secret society that invent a civilization, and create the impression of its former existence through creating an encyclopedia to describe its cultural facets and history, and also fashioning false artifacts.

I guess if you found a group of artifacts that express a particular era and sense of design you might well conclude that a community once used them, that they lived their lives using them.

It is that sense of things that were handled and were a focus for human energy that makes a former culture so much more real than just stories about them, to my mind at least. Certainly how different would the myth of Atlantis be, if we had objects that were, or could have been Atlantean?

I can identify with the knife fascination. I was given an Indian ceremonial knife with a wooden sheath at a young age by a relative. I poured over it, frustrated by the fact I could only do so when closely watched by adults.

Something sharp that hides in darkness, and gleams when drawn. Well, that was going to appeal to a young boy I guess.

However, I don't think it was the destructive potential of it, it was that the knife was somehow so complete in itself, so impossible to hedge your bets around, so real. A bit like the edge of a cliff, you know it is supposed to be dangerous, but it marks a boundary between things you just get used to and things you can never afford to let out of your attention.

***

Thank you.

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