the parsley.blog.landscape.life

100_2135, originally uploaded by The Nitpicker.

it’s a sad thing to see a neglected blog. what happened? did the blogger get busy or lose interest? did he or she run out of things to say? or did something terrible happen?

something close to 95% of blogs just stop at some point. but the stake in the ground remains. the blog name and address, and the past posts. are they more or less valuable when the new material stops coming?

terra nullius means, land that belongs to no one. in practice, this legal concept has tended to mean that territory which is “unimproved” by its inhabitants is free for the taking. in the days of the Homestead Act, a homestead was free land you could claim, but you had to “improve” it in order to maintain your claim.

I am not so sure that new buildings should always be called “improvements” (as they still are in real estate law.) not everything that comes anew is welcome. as alain de betton reminds us: “There are few harsher indictments against architecture than the sadness we feel at the arrival of bulldozers.”

if the blog is to continue, some things will have to change. I can no longer hang the whole thing on the armature of photographs, since I will not be able to take new pictures at a sufficient rate to keep things going. there are only so many possible views of my windowsill, and I believe I have taken them all already.

so, you know what they say: if you’re losing the game, change the rules. like europeans in the new world, I find my way cleared for me by disease. I know the fine old John Winthrop quote about “God hath thereby cleared our title to this place,” etc. etc. I don’t subscribe to theories of either meaning or opportunity when it comes to horrible diseases, my own or anybody else’s. the only thing you can do is live with the knowledge that things have truly changed.