Yes, I just quoted Men At Work at you, and no, I don't feel bad about it. Let's kick off the holiday season with a brief talk - not about the strong whiff of retail despair coming from the stores in the mall, but about Revisionist History. Changing the story. Straying from the truth. Embellishing, if you will.
You've all seen those little historical themed holiday villages, right? The kind that come with the inevitable Victorian manor, general store, ice skating pond, and several cute figurines in clothing appropriate for some time between 1880-1930? Iron lampposts, fake snow, a couple of decorated trees - they're everywhere. And yours, my dear friend, is vastly incomplete. Because you don't have a Wal-Mart.
I can't find it online - I keep getting lost in Village People stuff and bread - but at least in stores, Wal-Mart is offering an addition - an historicized Wal-Mart store to add to your quaint village for only $12. Never mind that Sam Walton opened his first Wal-Mart in 1962. Now you can pretend it's always been around. Discount corsets, stiff original gold-rush-era Levis, depression glass, firewood, and cast-iron irons for all!
(Anyone with the time to find this product online and link it would be appreciated.) -AL
Monday, November 30, 2009
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
An Archival Thanksgiving
This year, I am thankful for getting back to the simple things in life:
- Money, as in having, as in not having enough, but having barely enough to splurge all out a few months ago and purchase health insurance for the entire family for the first time ever, for at least the next six months.
- The lights are on, at least partially, some of the time, but not in the hallways, and that means we can still pay our power bill, barely, and we’re not archiving by candlelight, which everyone knows is a royal fire hazard, as seen in the Great Fire of Archive #47 back in 1927 when a sleepy archivist forgot to snuff his flame before dozing on his desk, destroying most of the records of the record-breaking Blass-Hoyton merger; the company going up in smoke in the crash of ’29 and both founders ending their lives ignobly selling apples on the corner, singing Disney songs.
- Paper. I can print things, things like recipes that will never actually get made because really, we’re too tired to cook, and who actually has five roasting pans anyway?
- A rolly office chair. It’s fun to scoot around in circles when no one is watching. The chair doesn’t corner very well, so maybe Santa can bring an upgrade. Also, that time I raced a cart down the corridor – good times.
- The last company holiday party I attended, I left with so much swag I nearly fell out of the car. They even splurged on the fancy battery-operated blinky-light trinkets that are not only reusable – the batteries can be replaced – they have actual off switches. (Clearly, this wasn’t an archive event – batteries are not archival material.)
- Tweed newsboy caps. Why not? Hats should make a comeback, so that we can then bring back manners. As in, take your hat off when you walk inside a building, unless you’re a woman, in which case your hat cost so much and looks so fabulous we may well just bury you in it, and wouldn’t you be the best-dressed person in a coffin at that funeral?
- Worst case scenario, we still have a few personal belongings that could be sold to replace income, such as one car, a television, and possibly my spouse’s cat.
- Dave Barry could be working here. No one would be safe then. -AL
- Money, as in having, as in not having enough, but having barely enough to splurge all out a few months ago and purchase health insurance for the entire family for the first time ever, for at least the next six months.
- The lights are on, at least partially, some of the time, but not in the hallways, and that means we can still pay our power bill, barely, and we’re not archiving by candlelight, which everyone knows is a royal fire hazard, as seen in the Great Fire of Archive #47 back in 1927 when a sleepy archivist forgot to snuff his flame before dozing on his desk, destroying most of the records of the record-breaking Blass-Hoyton merger; the company going up in smoke in the crash of ’29 and both founders ending their lives ignobly selling apples on the corner, singing Disney songs.
- Paper. I can print things, things like recipes that will never actually get made because really, we’re too tired to cook, and who actually has five roasting pans anyway?
- A rolly office chair. It’s fun to scoot around in circles when no one is watching. The chair doesn’t corner very well, so maybe Santa can bring an upgrade. Also, that time I raced a cart down the corridor – good times.
- The last company holiday party I attended, I left with so much swag I nearly fell out of the car. They even splurged on the fancy battery-operated blinky-light trinkets that are not only reusable – the batteries can be replaced – they have actual off switches. (Clearly, this wasn’t an archive event – batteries are not archival material.)
- Tweed newsboy caps. Why not? Hats should make a comeback, so that we can then bring back manners. As in, take your hat off when you walk inside a building, unless you’re a woman, in which case your hat cost so much and looks so fabulous we may well just bury you in it, and wouldn’t you be the best-dressed person in a coffin at that funeral?
- Worst case scenario, we still have a few personal belongings that could be sold to replace income, such as one car, a television, and possibly my spouse’s cat.
- Dave Barry could be working here. No one would be safe then. -AL
Friday, November 13, 2009
A Noble Profession?
Do you remember the fuss about a couple years back, when there was a spike in couples marrying on the seventh of July, 2007, all for the auspicious anniversary combination 7-7-2007? Imagine what it will be like on July 7, 7007. Yes, five thousand years from now. All those sevens. And what will these luck-chasing optimists know of us today?
You see, we have records from five thousand years ago, in one way or another. We have archaeological remains of temples and homes, we have bodies and mummies and bones, we have dendrochronology telling of climate change, we have ice cores and pollen counts to tell us what was growing and how far along agricultural practices had developed, we have DNA to trace the domestication of animals, and we have the lasting trails of metals from Copper Age mines - five thousand years ago - showing us clearly that our ancient forefathers, in their ignorance, were subjecting themselves and their families to heavy metal poisoning all in the search for a better axe. We also have records, and languages, and enough to figure out a general idea of population movement and cultural change.
Archivists - and those who work in or with records management - and librarians - all of us - can get buried in the mundane chores, the technical hang-ups, the red tape. We forget that we're all in the same business and on the same team. We're here, every day, doing what we do, for the quiet glory and stubborn persistence enabling the preservation of the records of humanity.
Because one lucky day, a generation that cannot fathom us will stand on the cusp of their future. And some of them will look at brittle papers and ancient bindings, and some of them will ask questions, and some of them will dream of those who came before - us.
-AL
You see, we have records from five thousand years ago, in one way or another. We have archaeological remains of temples and homes, we have bodies and mummies and bones, we have dendrochronology telling of climate change, we have ice cores and pollen counts to tell us what was growing and how far along agricultural practices had developed, we have DNA to trace the domestication of animals, and we have the lasting trails of metals from Copper Age mines - five thousand years ago - showing us clearly that our ancient forefathers, in their ignorance, were subjecting themselves and their families to heavy metal poisoning all in the search for a better axe. We also have records, and languages, and enough to figure out a general idea of population movement and cultural change.
Archivists - and those who work in or with records management - and librarians - all of us - can get buried in the mundane chores, the technical hang-ups, the red tape. We forget that we're all in the same business and on the same team. We're here, every day, doing what we do, for the quiet glory and stubborn persistence enabling the preservation of the records of humanity.
Because one lucky day, a generation that cannot fathom us will stand on the cusp of their future. And some of them will look at brittle papers and ancient bindings, and some of them will ask questions, and some of them will dream of those who came before - us.
-AL
Monday, November 2, 2009
Happy Monday!
It's November, it's Monday, and you need this:
Eric, at the Robert Mills House, downtown, with one of the many scarecrow entries.
Eric, at the Robert Mills House, downtown, with one of the many scarecrow entries.
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