The Last Days of Summer

If I had to make a list of the symbols of Gen X 's formative years, this giant slide would definitely make the list. I remember being at a carnival as a six years old - climbing the colossal staircase and racing down on a rectangle of burlap. 

I call these kinds of slides Gen X slides

I remember standing at the top of the slide like I was on top of the world. I refused let fear take over as I stood looking at all the faraway people below. Instead, I chose to embrace the rush. I think I'm in that place in life again now....

This week my family and I went to Oaks Park in Portland and it was my little one's first time to go to an amusement park. She loved it more than I would have even expected. Whether it was the mini roller coaster, or the kid-sized hot air balloons, she was fearless. 

May your last days of summer be full of sweet moments, and firsts, and fearlessness. 



Oregon Coast

The West Coast is such a Gen X place, from the film studios of Southern California where they made the movies we watched in theaters up to the Northern CA and Oregon coasts where they filmed movies we watched on VHS. The Pacific Northwest is an especially big piece of the landscape of Gen X since this is where grunge emerged. So many stories are here. So many of our stories are here. 

(c) 2012 photos by Chloe - Oregon Coast 

Xingularity

There is an amazing film about Generation X currently in production called Xingularity. 

The film's web site defines singularity:

a point or region of infinite mass density at which space and time are infintely distorted by gravitational forces and which is held to be the final state of matter falling into a black hole. 

In Natural Sciences: 
a point in space time in which gravitational forces cause matter to have an infinite density and zero volume. 


And the film itself is described by those creating this amazing project: 

Xingularity is a wholly independent, raw and unflinching deconstruction of the variable that is Generation X. 

An attempt at exploring and redefining aspects of the most unconventional, ill-defined and misunderstood generation in American history. 

Much like our lives, it is a 'work in progress'.

Here is the YouTube teaser - I shed a few tears as I watched many important pieces of my Gen X history and the history of the Gen X collective experience unfold...



www.genxfilm.com

The film's web site is beautifully done and you'll find a nostalgia link listing many events and issues that Gen X is familiar with, along with many words that describe who we have been or who we are now like: indefinable, angry, rebellious, abandoned, questioning, and anti-establishment. 

Manny Merchan, Kerri Merchan, Kendra Kabasele, and all those working on the project are in the process of creating something well-researched, insightful, and undoubtedly profound.  I can hardly wait to see where this will take us...



The Miracle of You

You are a miracle.  Every one of your direct ancestors - going back through all the generations before your generation to the beginning of humanity as we know it - lived to pass on the DNA that became you. 


Author and blogger Dr. Ali Binazir did the actual calculations and the probability of your existing at all is:

 1 in 10^2,685,000

Various analogies can be given to try and wrap your head around this number.

One example is this: two million people getting together each day to play a game of dice with a trillion sided die...and they all come up with the same number.

Another example comes from Buddhist teaching: Imagine there was one life preserver thrown somewhere in some ocean and there is exactly one turtle in all of these oceans, swimming underwater somewhere...the probability that you came about and exist today is the same as that turtle sticking its head out of the water - in the middle of the preserver.  On one try.


Here is my analogy: Let's say there was a factory that makes confetti cake sprinkles and of all the millions of sprinkles, there is one that has been marked with your initials on it. Let's say every employee in the factory takes all the lids off every container in every case of sprinkles in the whole building and throws them up into the air as high as they can simultaneously. Let's say someone is walking around in random patterns all over the factory and this person lifts up his hand in the very moment the sprinkles are launched...only to catch the one piece that has your initials on it in the center of his palm. 

A recent article on a Catholic web site does a great job on explaining the sanctity of this...

http://blog.adw.org/2011/09/the-probability-of-you-existing-at-all-is-almost-non-existent-a-brief-refelction-on-the-contingency-of-our-being-based-on-a-recent-math-article/

And here we are above in one big group photo - Generation X!

You landed in the palm of God's hand.  Live your life like it is a miracle.  It is. 



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(c) 2012 photography and writing by Chloe - all rights reserved

Ground Kontrol

I recently went with a friend to Ground Kontrol, a well-loved retro Portland arcade. The place was full of Gen X and Gen Y people, and a lot of familiar classic arcade games like Tetris, Donkey Kong, Tron, Pac-Man, Centipede, and others. I noticed a few priceless Gen X images around and I decided I would have to snap a few shots to share...

This image will forever be ingrained in the visual memories of  Gen Xers.   

Mappy?  I don't remember this one.  

Very cool under-lit tables bring ambiance to the restaurant/bar area.  

Friendly, bearded people drinking unpretentious beer, a prominently displayed

 recycling center, and a menu with gluten free options on it..what could be more Portland than this?  

Fiber optic lighting, and restrooms that have to-the-pixel Pac-Man/Ms. Pac-Man tile mosaics on the bathroom floor, and a fun overall ambiance....

In addition to regular video games, there are also a lot of pin ball machines on the upper level.  Here are some images from an a seriously old-school early 70s game:

As Gen Xers lived a nomadic existence in their growing up years, an arcade was a place that they could go that would more or less be the same from one town to another. Video games and pinball machines have truly become part of the landscape of our collective experience.

Thanks for reading, and may you have the kind of week where you unexpectedly get 1000 bonus points 

all at once....

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(c) 2012 photography and writing by Chloe - all rights reserved

When God Visits Baseball Fields

Some people say they experience or sense the presence of God in church or some place of worship. Many say that it is more often found in other places - in random places, or places in nature, or during some moment of the human experience. I was at the park with my family recently, and because it's a really new park, hardly anyone yet knows about it so there was hardly anyone there. My family and I had entire baseball fields to walk around on barefoot, the sun was bright, and the breeze was cool. My husband took my daughter to run around in the distance. Since there was no one in sight, I lied down on the grass for a while. When I sat up, I instantly stood up, because it was in this moment I felt that sacred presence.  Because of the solemnity and even the intimacy of moments like these I would normally hesitate to photograph that presence, it felt in that moment that I needed to. Late sunlight came spilling out onto the soft, green grass, and maybe a little bit of the profound peace and warmth I could feel as I stood there with this sense that it is all going to work out - that it is all going to be okay, that it is all going to be amazing. Sometimes God shows up next to the spray of waterfalls, or among the incense during a liturgical offering, or in the warm embrace of someone who wholeheartedly loves you. Sometimes, when the clouds are silver and the sun is perfect, God shows up in baseball fields.  

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(c) 2012 photography and writing by Chloe Koffas - all rights reserved

What I Learned from the Fireflies at Dusk Project

Spring came at the end of the Fireflies at Dusk project , and a tiny egg had fallen from a tree and landed softly on the grass of my back yard - it looked as if a baby bird had hatched from it just moments before.... 

I had set out to bring alive many of the things from the general collective experience of Gen X as well as specific things from my own childhood by doing the Fireflies at Dusk project.  The experience was extraordinary.  The project took on a life of its own and went in directions I often did not expect.

This is what I learned:

1) That you must demand time to stop before it passes you by.  Living within time comes when you can stop constantly chasing it.  This can be either the moment or the season.  Little ones constantly teach us how to do this.

2) You must stop and acknowledge how alive you really are.  Only good things can follow this, and you find that unexpected doors open for you.

3) When you have a thought surface in your consciousness over a long period of time, this often means you need to do something about it.  Finding old readers from my childhood that had surfaced constantly in my memory ended up causing this whole project to happen.


Pack and your bags and visit that place.
Open the book and read the story.

We often wait far too long to do things that are close to our hearts.  Why not do it now, why not do it this weekend?

When you make things come alive that are close to your heart, it will come alive for the people you love, too.  Soon  you will find that your memories become fused together -  full of the same things, the same places, the same moments.

My daughter and I held this little blue shell in our hands while a baby bird in the nest above us began its first day of life.  Little ones always stop to enjoy the miraculous while we rush by it.  If we stop and enjoy it too, it will change us.

What if the narrative of your childhood is still being written?  What if you can bring light to the places that were good and make them come alive and in the process make what was dark become less dark?   I spent a year of my life showing people I love the good things from my growing-up years and by making new traditions for my family, my hope is that others will be inspired to do the same.

What matters is bringing good things and memories to life - and what bears the most weight of all is the issue of now - the present moment.   There are children now, in this moment experiencing their childhoods and childhood is a powerful time that stays with you always.  Because it is so important, we need to do everything we can as Gen Xers to protect, love nurture, and bring joy to our children.  Whether or not you're a parent, there are always fun things you can do with the kids in your life (or even the adults in your life who are kids at heart.)

This project also turned out to be in part a quest to find my authentic self.  Sometimes we need to meet up with that person in some other city or even in your own backyard and make some promise to live with more conviction - the kind that prompts you to follow your own heart.  During this project - a project that became a journey - I learned how to be more true to the substance that makes up my soul.  And in the short time we are given to live our life, being true to ourselves is one of the most important things we can do.  Thank you for going on this journey with me.

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(c) 2012 photography and writing by Chloe - all rights reserved