Abandoned Signs
I found these signs at the top of an office building near the port, next to the highway. I was taking photos with Nour for our stop motion video, which we didn’t end up using. We were trying to get to the highest possible location to take pictures from, and we were going to ask the people on the top floor if we could photograph from their window. No one was there, so we climbed onto the roof. It was full of these abandoned signs that obviously hadn’t been used in a while.
There is something sort of unsettling about these signs for some reason. They are made big enough that it is clear that they are meant to be seen from the road. There was obviously effort put into making them and they must have served a purpose, but now it is impossible to tell what they were for or what they said. They just sit up on the roof of this unremarkable building, close to the port, exposed to the elements, slowly rusting away because no one bothered to throw them away, or find another use for them. It’s not that they are particularly special; it is just indicative of the way that many things get left behind, lose importance. Things are meaningful when they are useful, or if they gain sentimental value. And they lose their meaning again when they no longer serve their purpose, or no longer connect to that particular emotion that caused them to have sentimental value.
Maybe these signs were once for an earlier purpose the building had, and when first put up indicated a new pride in the business, or a better sign than what had hung there previously, indicating hope for better business, more customers, maybe a new management, or a renovation. The signs had to be planned out, color, size and font decided, made, transported and installed. And later taken down. And left. So many things in our daily life happen in this way; planned, considered, produced, briefly noticed, forgotten. This is the way it works. But what about planning in a place where things are unpredictable? What is the point, for example, of making eye-catching signs if no one is going to look at them after being distracted by the instability elsewhere in the city? What is the point of planning at all, saving money, getting an education, preparing for the future, when things are so uncertain?
Maybe behaving as if we have no idea what is going to happen is wise. Then we will be less shocked when things don’t happen as expected. Maybe this sort of thinking makes much more sense than acting as if everything we do is a step in a very particular direction, a new stone in a straight path. Much of what we do doesn’t take us anywhere specific. Our the results of our actions teach us lessons, or don’t, and give us experience, but in the end, even in the most predictable of circumstances, there is always something that comes up. Something that deviates from the well-laid plan. Often, we just find that things are not how we expected them, do not live up to our expectations. Sometimes, even when everything goes exactly as we’d hoped, we still change our minds about what we want. And of course disaster can strike at any moment; the death of loved ones, fires, destruction, crime, war, natural disasters. And smaller things can also throw plans off course, hearts can be broken, or breakdowns can happen after which things which seemed important before no longer are.
