Purple flowers not
All violets should be called
Research oft yields truth
In the hopes of starting this visuo-literary journey on the best foot possible, I thought it prudent to mention that the purple flowers growing on the chain link fence are – to the best of my knowledge – not actually violets. They are lovely, however, and if my horticultural knowledge was as well developed as my knowledge of say, baking, or the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis (please, look it up!), I’d definitely share their proper name.
As for “the squalor of modern life (if you will)”, Mr. Sweeney, I won’t. Modern life is an exemplification of many things: resource misuse, overzealous politicians, satellite television, and the Apple takeover (cause for celebration!), to name a few. On the other hand, if you asked me where to find squalor, I’d probably point you many hundreds of years into the past to the Dark Ages. Any life in which technicolored vines grow on rusty metal fences is not one I would call squalid (“foul and repulsive, as from lack of care or cleanliness; neglected and filthy,” likely from the Latin squalere, “be rough or dirty”). Perhaps this fence is lacking in care, and very possibly it is tremendously unclean, but it is eye candy nonetheless. This flowered fence is modern life: an unlikely marriage of man and nature. And it’s probably worth noting that when this fence has rusted into a pile of oxidized metal flakes and is blown about the alleyway by a passing wind, those purple flowers or some descendent of those purple flowers will likely still be around. Chew on that for a while, if you will.
I’m also not sure that this blog is around because “Seeing takes effort.” Actually, I’m pretty sure that seeing takes very little effort; if one is not blind and one has one’s eyes open, one basically can’t help but see. I’d say that noticing takes a bit more effort, though. Appreciating takes a handful more still. That’s certainly why I’m around. If you’re reading this, chances are pretty good that you can see. But you might not notice the natural phenomena growing next to the dumpster behind your apartment, and you might not notice the fluttering flags of your university peeking around the trees at Forest Park, and you might not appreciate how tremendously inspiring it is that beauty can trump practicality in the unlikeliest of places.
If some of that sounds intriguing, however, or
if you’re a noticing/appreciating connoisseur and you’d like some company, or
if you think that the discussion/bickering of (sometimes) semi-pretentious university students over the world around them sounds like dessert,
feel free to stick around.