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Beyond Hartford: Yale Peabody Revisited
The first time I visited the Yale Peabody Museum in New Haven was shortly before they closed for their several year renovation project. It felt dated, and I say that as someone who holds onto clothing for decades and doesn’t see the point of ripping out one’s kitchen simply because their counters aren’t in style anymore.
Humans: April 5, 2024
Remember how the sun was out earlier this week, before we had the day of Every Type of Precipitation Imaginable?. This is proof of people and proof of sunlight. Want to comment? (1) Take responsibility for your opinions by using your full name (2) Keep it brief (3) Keep it respectful (4) Victim-blaming will not stand (5) Read full article before commenting.
Beyond: Black Rock, Bridgeport
[First time visitor? Coming here directly? Stop and learn about the Beyond Hartford, Beyond Cars series before reading on]. I have been patiently waiting for a reason to dig into local cryptid lore. It’s hard to know when the tales begin. In 1857, a sea serpent was seen near...
Humans: March 29, 2024
The theme this week is: forgetting to take my camera with me, so you get blurry, distant shots of people out and about in Hartford. Want to comment? (1) Take responsibility for your opinions by using your full name (2) Keep it brief (3) Keep it respectful (4) Victim-blaming will not stand (5) Read full article before commenting.
Misalignment
“Frankenstein was a scientist. The monster was nameless. It never existed, except as a metaphor for curiosity turned to hubris and then tragedy. The future, with its sunscreen-smearing jets and its desperate attempts to cool the planet, is presumably imaginary –for now.”. – Kate Marvel, from “A Handful of...
Not Fancy, Not Perfect, Not Your Punching Bag
Can you imagine driving from Tolland to Hartford but then having the nerve to complain to the media about graffiti on a building here, as if your choice to commute ~20 miles is less offensive, less polluting to the air we have to breathe? Yep, someone just did that. No, I will not link to it.
Include Public Transit Directions if You Want the Public to Stop By
Listening to WNPR the other day I learned about a climate change exhibit at a museum in Waterbury. When I visited their website to find out hours and directions, I saw that they only listed driving instructions. Paradigms do not change on their own, so I sleuthed around for email addresses and then reached out to the staff members who I thought most likely to be able to fix this, pointing out the inconsistency of dedicating wall space to this topic but not taking it from intellectual exercise to actual practice. Within the hour I heard back, graciously, that they would fix it.
Belonging
“In the settler mind, land was property, real estate, capital, or natural resources. But to our people, it was everything: identity, the connection to our ancestors, the home of our nonhuman kinfolk, our pharmacy, our library, the source of all that sustained us. Our lands were where our responsibility to the world was enacted, sacred ground. It belonged to itself; it was a gift, not a commodity, so it could never be bought or sold. These are the meanings people took with them when they were forced from their ancient homelands to new places.”
You’re Doing It Right Now
“Governed by fear, people are largely cooperative with systems that produce torture, mass death, and annihilation. That is the greatest danger that fear poses: not panic amid disorder, but cooperation with an order that we ought to find unspeakable”. – Kelly Hayes & Mariame Kaba in Let This Radicalize You.
Self Defense
It saps your energy, depletes your time, and robs your of your ability to dream. And we need lots of dreamers and doers right now.”. What the world needs now is love, and a lot of therapy, and one of those emotion charts to help people identify how they are feeling, like really feeling, so that they can own it and perhaps stop their spiraling.
A Little Something (March 2024)
Here’s your curated Hartford event calendar for March 2024. What makes this list? Events that I would either attend or recommend to a good friend. Review events with the host/venue to confirm details have not changed since publication. ADD TO CALENDAR. SPRING ART EXHIBIT: The Garmany Visitor Center in...
Dysfunctional City Hall
One of the very few things that went right in City Hall last night was someone’s decision to bring in Officer Jimmy Barrett, the only police officer that has earned the trust of most people here. Truthfully, he was the only one needed and the many others in and outside of City Hall could have been dismissed since they served no function that I could see. They didn’t step in when a drunk guy holding the Israel flag and a “We Stand with Israel” sign yelled “Kill The Jews” just feet from the steps of the municipal building. They didn’t step in when someone called a woman wearing a hijab a murderer. Not when a person called two musicians “Hamas Quartet.” They didn’t step in when some guy followed me around yelling “Hitler Jew”, and continued trying to pick a fight. For the record, I have years of experience ignoring dudes yelling things at me on the street; the most satisfying response is to completely ignore them by not looking at or speaking with them. A person with an instrument walked over and literally drummed out the guy with pro-Israel accessories who was saying antisemitic nonsense to me. The police did not need to step in because pro-ceasefire activists provided marshals who maintained the peace.
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Life in Hartford, Connecticut, and beyond. Exploration, wandering, transportation, transit, art, and environment.
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