if one cares at all for the truth, it is important
to periodically step back and look at what defines
the world around us, and by extension, ourselves.
in algonquin river state hospital’s case, it is defined by
its grand ambitions and idealistic foundation -
and now, by the collapse of these noble ambitions.
it is a place haunted by the scores of tragedies that litter its past,
by its inability to integrate into the world around it,
and its inevitable decline into obsolescence and disrepair -
much like me.
if i were to be honest, i don’t want to see it demolished,
but i don’t want to see it restored either.
it is what it is because of these things,
and its status as some behemoth
enshrouded in its own obscurity and decay makes it
larger than life, legendary even.
to tear it down to make some development or store
seems so pedestrian, insultingly dull, in much the same way as
trying to undo all of the damage wrought upon it,
cleaning it and sterilizing it and packaging it for the masses
ultimately belittles what it truly is. you may look at it
and wince at the sheer scale of the calamity it has become,
but no matter what you think it has finally revealed its true nature,
and has become something far more intricate and ornate
than our ordinary world,
with its gray cubicles and prefabricated sentiments, allows.
to see algonquin river state hospital, you have to actively seek it,
much like you are making a pilgrimage to some hallowed site
that is a shrine to all that fails, all hopes that are smashed by time.
to change it, to ‘save’ it, ultimately destroys it anyway.
and so too, i suppose there is something necessary about
my own longing to leave this world. if i were not consumed by my
relentless desire for my own destruction, why would i seek such things?
sometimes it is the very things that eat us apart,
that ultimately kill us, even, that are our own defining characteristics.
i have no delusions about my own greatness, or lack thereof, but nevertheless
if edgar allen poe wouldn’t have followed a trajectory that left him
dead in some back street’s gutter, if van gogh hadn’t followed a path
of loneliness so severe that it drove him mad -
would we ever know of their works? would they even have accomplished any?
i postulate that dissatisfaction is the mother of creation.
without it we have no incentive to create or to change, as
contentment is suspicious of change, lest it throw off comfortable equilibrium.
and so i suppose my own defining characteristics are a necessary evil.
were i to be happy, were i not to suffer,
this work that i do that defines me, that is paradoxically one of my only joys
would likely cease to be as well.
i don’t want to be a walmart, a business park, a playground.
when i am gone, let it be left to those few who care
to wonder at what drove me to do what i do, and
what frightening and magnificent things i saw in places like this.
i have chosen this path and where it will lead me, all in the hope that
it will entertain, edify, and maybe even enlighten
those of you gracious enough to join me and peer into my life through
the small window of my camera’s lens.
this is my downward spiral in all its splendor, friends.
enjoy.
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photo taken at algonquin river state hospital.
more of my work is online at www.abandonedamerica.org