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Category: Pix

Pumped

I’m super pumped to announce that I’m having my first solo exhibition.

Pump Up

Nope, this photo won’t be part of it. It didn’t quite meet my exacting standards of quality. However several other photos from the same site and other locations in Louisiana and Indiana will be featured. Come on down to the Lower Nine and take a gander. It’s at the Martin Luther King Library, 1611 Caffin Ave., and it’ll be up for the entire month of December.

The name of the show is After the Peak, and it’s a fantasy about post-oil America. Every schoolchild knows that fossil fuels are not renewable resources. Someday, we will run out. The question is when. Some say we’ve already passed the peak of production, while others say we haven’t reached it yet. Currently our species seems hellbent on extracting all the petrochemical deposits from the Earth’s crust as quickly as possible. That only hastens our approach to depletion. As I photographed abandoned gas stations and automobile dealerships, I imagined a future when all such sites are neglected and left to fall into ruin.

Come join me for the opening reception on the 7th of December, 6-8pm. More details on PhotoNOLA.

I Was Not Killed This Morning

Last night we had dinner with an old friend and his new wife. When the topic turned to cycling in New Orleans, she confessed she was fearful for her safety, and she enumerated an appallingly long list of friends and acquaintances who have been severely injured when their bicycles collided with automobiles.

This morning a number of friends contacted me, concerned that I was perhaps no longer among the living. I’m still here, but a man about my age was killed at Jeff Davis and Canal Street. He was riding a bike and was struck by a car, or so I read.

"A driver killed a cyclist here today."

I was not killed this morning, but it could have been me. Until the new year, I passed through this intersection at least twice a day. This is a dangerous intersection for bicyclists; there are not even stripes to designate where the Jeff Davis bike path crosses Canal Street.

No Stripes

This reminds me why I first got motivated to pursue the construction of a trail in the Lafitte Corridor ten years ago, and why the work of groups like FOLC and Bike Easy is so important. We need to do better by our cyclists and pedestrians.

For now, though, my heart goes out to the man who was killed this morning, and to his family.

Tree Blessing

Nov. 16, 2013: I officiated a civic tree-blessing ceremony on the bayou. We had a real-live fire dancer and Big Chief David Montana led us in singing “Indian Red.” Still can’t believe this really happened. It seems remarkable that someone like me, without any relevant credential, would be invited to do something like this. Many thanks to Jared Zeller et al for pulling this together. And thanks to Michael Homan for taking these photos.