Spatial Awareness and Old Gadgets

 

What do we miss out on when we fail to notice?

I recently re-read a brilliant piece by author Elizabeth Stice in Front Porch Republic: The Power of Place: Payphones. 

Stice is a self-described "payphone flaneur." In other words, she traverses areas off the beaten path in search of old payphones. This new hobby, she explains, has significantly augmented her sense of place and spatial awareness. 

Here are just a few payphones that Stice has photographed:

You can find a plethora of such photographs on Stice's Instagram page, @phoningpalmbeach. She updates this account regularly, with her last post from just a day ago. 

From Stice:

The value in seeing payphones is the way it develops a practice of seeing. So often we are driving or walking down streets, unaware of what serves us no purpose or where we aren’t heading. Looking for things forces you to notice things.

I'll admit: I shut off my peripheral vision when traveling to work, or even when going to meet a friend. I am, in many ways, a utilitarian walker, with my sights set on the destination, and the destination alone. But, in doing this, I am missing out on my surroundings: trees, people, architecture, animals, and, yes, even relics from the past. 

Do you ever notice these signs?

Fallout shelter sign on building

These are, of course, relics from the Cold War. During a time of collective paranoia about a potential nuclear holocaust, these signs indicated that a building had a basement that could, if needed, function as a fallout shelter. Surely, you've come across at least a few. 

Sadly, though, much like the payphone, these signs are being torn down and discarded, as their utility and practical use has obviously waned. 

I was, however, pleased to discover Fallout Five Zero, a site dedicated to keeping the memory of these once ubiquitous signs alive. 

Remnant from a fallout shelter sign on Bishop Cheverus School in East Boston.
 

Look at the sad, pale shadow of where this fallout shelter sign once was. You can find many similar photos on the Fallout Five Zero page here.  

How often, though, do we notice things like this? I can tell you, pretty matter-of-factly, that I would have walked right past this sign remnant. Sad, really. 

We (and by we I, of course, mean me too) have to pay closer attention to our surroundings. Many of our communities are replete with rich, historical nuggets. They die when we stop noticing them. 

Stice's article also got me thinking about old technology, that we would today consider obsolete. When, for instance, is the last time you saw a walkman?  

I just purchased one, and have been thoroughly enjoying the hunt for cool cassette tapes to play on it. I'm loving this one from jazz saxophonist, Coleman Hawkins. 

My new Coleman Hawkins cassette (The Golden Hawk, 1979).

These cassettes have, no doubt, been accruing dust for decades. By listening to them today, I am, in a way, keeping them alive and breathing. 

My main extrapolation here, I suppose, is that we benefit from 1. being cognizant of our surroundings and 2. appreciating what has been forgotten. 

My father recently reminded me of this Ernest Hemingway quote: "Every man has two deaths, when he is buried in the ground and the last time someone says his name." 

Let us strive to keep our communities - payphones, fallout shelter signs, and all - alive...

The Need For Intact Families

The societal salience of two-parent households used to be obvious. Today, however, this social structure has been labeled reactionary, an antiquated norm from a bygone era. 

But there is no disputing the facts: children raised by both parents are far better equipped for the world than their counterparts from single-parent households. 

While inconvenient for some to hear, this is an empirical reality. 

Robert Putnam in his 2015 book, Our Kids: The American Dream In Crisis, takes this even further with his thesis that kids raised by a mother and father with college degrees have the best outcomes. 

His rigorous research, both qualitative (interviews and anecdotes) and quantitative (graphs and regression models) makes his conclusions hard to challenge. 

But, college education aside, we must concede the point: children from two-parent households are more likely to perform well in school and in their professional careers, and are less likely to become addicted to drugs and commit crime. 

What's more, children raised by both parents perform far better economically. There is myriad data to support this. Author William A. Galston once wrote that "the best antipoverty program for children is a stable, intact family." 

Certain paleo-conservative and traditionalist sectaries, it should be noted, will take the two-parent family to mean the "nuclear family," wherein mom stays at home and dad is the breadwinner. This is, in fact, reactionary and unrealistic. The perceived halcyon days of the 1950s are, whether they like it or not, long behind us. Today, dual-income households are the norm. 

This fact, however, does not diminish the overwhelmingly positive role that both parents play in a child's formative years. 

I am beyond fortunate to have been raised by two incredible parents. I am deeply saddened, however, when I think of all the children who were not so lucky. They started from a severe disadvantage. 

Gen-Z, some of whom are becoming parents now, must inculcate robust family values in their children. We need badly to return to a previous temperament that glorifies the two-parent model.