I think this scene is perfectly marvelous. And, I don't know where it is. Or even, for that matter, if it is a "real" scene. What with the ability of artists and technicians to concoct all manner of seeming reality out of 'whole cloth' (as people were wont to say at one time), one could take the pessimistic view and lose the pleasure of seeing a beautiful scene merely because it might not be "real". Real or not, I like it.

Now, for those fascinated (or worried) by the question of whether a "real" experience is better or more to be preferred than an "imaginary" experience (or perhaps more accurately, an "imagined experience") -- which should not be confused with the question of whether the content of a drug induced involunatry hallucination is "real" -- it seems to me that the question of whether "imagination" is as good as "reality" makes a fundamental assumption about the nature of "reality" which just may be false. I think that those people who vehemently insist that there is just ONE reality, and it is the SAME reality for everyone, are the same people who insist that we, human beings, are nothing but a remarkably complex collection of atoms, electrical charges and chemical interactions and that we have no uniquely, and non-corporeal, 'mental' or 'spiritual' component. In other words, there is no "ghost in the machine" (or deus ex machina). The machine simply runs itself. Of course, the assumption --- and it is an assumption --- that one must prove the existence of an un-seeable soul, spirit or other non-corporeal agent, for the simple reason that one can't see it, really ends the inquiry before it starts. If you're interested in this kind of inquiry, you really have to ask yourself from the get-go, why it is that you assume that you've got to be able to see, touch, taste, smell, hit, gouge, run over and otherwise mechanically manipulate in order for "it" to be "real"?

So, to bring this 'round back to where I started ... while writing this post, I realized that part of what makes this photograph/representation so inviting is, for me anyway, that it actually represents a "real" scene which has been 'created' and actually exists in the firmament. I'd still think it is a pretty and impressive bit of art work even if it were made from 'whole cloth'. But, for me, its (presumed) representational nature makes a difference in how thorougly I enjoy viewing this scene.

In "Don't Fact-Check the Soul" (New York Times, April 29, 2008), Rosanne Cash observes that creativity is "outside" linear time and that commitment and diligence are more valuable, and productive, than infatuation, or as she calls it, youthful inspiration.

And, she's right. The supposition that everything we do, say, or feel must be a 'confession', or a reflection of some unyielding superstructure which exists entirely independently of our mark, our contribution our development of IT, is a misguided Freudian-style bias which wholly robs the soul of its power to create life, beauty and harmony.

We --- each of us, and all of us together --- are the creators of what there is, how it is conceived and what comes "after" now. Someone who is inclined to wallow in victim-hood would demur, I am sure. But, the fact remains that we aren't mere observers of what has been set in motion by forces greater than ourselves and which runs independently of our contribution to it. We are the authors of life, the architects of beauty and the managers of our self-directed fates.

Don't look for the truth. Create it.

Mother Earth, much like old Mother Hubbard who lived in a shoe, with so many children she didn't know quite what to do, is groaning from her childrens' wanton fertility. Today, January 30, 2008, it is reported in the New York Times that it is estimated that Mother's children will increase from 6.6 billion today to 9 billion in 2050 -- an increase of 2.4 billion souls in 42 years.

I suppose if you're a PC maker, chewing gum manufacturer, software vendor or pharmaceutical manufacturer, this news will be met with great relish and renewed vigor to plan on how to profit from this inevitable invading horde.

But, what if you are someone who relishes open, unspoiled, unregulated, naturally majestic and aesthetically and spiritually inspiring spaces? What are you to do? How can you preserve your dreams without seeming to be (or being) reactionary? Is it inevitable that crowding, poverty, squalor, division and discord become the norm? Do we have any right to load Mother down so thoroughly that we return to the medieval norm, in which, as Thomas Hobbes put it, life was "nasty, brutish and short"? Do we, in other words, have the right to shirk our responsibility to leave future generations with some fighting chance of creating good, worthwhile, reasonably pleasing and productive lives?

Is is right that we escape our bodies, knowing that in our wake, we left our Mother bedraggled, besotted, bereft and not even a little bemused?

Saving our Mother from an iniquitous future, which will almost certainly involve mass genocides the likes of which no rational sane being willingly contemplates, is a little like a weight-loss diet or improving your health after a long endorsement of indolence and irresponsibility and sloth: You have to take it one step at a time, on a gradient. But, if you don't get started, no matter how long it will take you, no matter if you have no idea how to reach your goal, or exactly in what direction it lays, then your good intentions, as the saying goes, will "pave the path to Hell".

So, let's get started. One gradient step at a time. Let's make our Mother proud. Stop our bickering, maligning, carping and complaining. Get along. Join in the one goal that each of us must share, if we share anything at all ... and that is to leave Mother better off than she was when we first laid eyes on her. Let's all, each of us in his or her own way, leave the world a little better off than when we got here and, when we come back, we'll surely be glad we did.