NONSENSES

The introduction of an article is a tool,
a means of helping the reader form a general idea 

and attitude towards the body text.

Waking up, I check the time to see if I am still tired. I've slept for eight hours. I am ready to rise, says the clock.


I feel cold, so I check the thermometer to see if I really am.

I feel a bit sick, so I take my temperature to find out if I am imagining it.

I am hungry; I cook some eggs and set the timer to five minutes. The eggs do not taste normal, so I check the date on the box to see if they actually taste bad. Apparently they do not.

I watch a film. I am not sure what to think, so I read reviews online to form my opinion.

I buy tickets to a concert, where I will observe others' reactions to decide whether I like it or not.

I listen to some music. It seems too loud. I check the settings on the speakers. It is not.

I weigh myself. I feel good, but the scale tells me I am too big.

It is snowing horizontally, but I have to take the car to the supermarket. I cannot see, but I drive at 120 km per hour since that is the speed limit.

My GPS tells me to take a left turn ”now”. I feel like I should go in the other direction, but I turn, nevertheless, and get lost.

I drive around looking for familiar corners, but soon the light on my petrol gauge tells me I cannot drive for long.

I leave my car and come across an enchanting landscape. I pick up my camera and concentrate on taking a photo of the view. This way I will know later on in life that I was there, then.

I need to cross the street. There is not a single car anywhere, but I only trust the traffic lights and wait for green.

I take the train. When it stops, the sign at the station says Amsterdam, but the announcement says Rotterdam.

ON MAIL DELIVERY

Having delivered mail for 

a few weeks, I find myself 

feeling deep affection for letter boxes

and wanting to push things into them.

 

Letter boxes come in different sizes and degrees of tightness, as do the letters that they devour. An ideal combination for a mailman is a hard, heavy piece of mail and a mature letter hole, one whose cover is not too tight but not entirely loose yet either. In this case, the mail can easily be delivered with one hand, the right hand, which makes things quicker since the left arm is holding the pile of undelivered letters.

Trying to push a small, soft letter into a tight box is the worst. It requires two hands, one for opening the slot and one for placing the item inside, and can be painful, because the delivering hand often gets stuck under the stiff cover. These situations give me cuts on my fingers and make the process slow and complicated. Whenever I find myself holding a hopelessly flabby letter, I hope that the previous penetrator has accidentally left the target hole open.

Rubber bands for binding the stacks of mail

Mail and boxes

Delivery bag

These boots are made for mail delivery

Please think about your mailman – take care of your letter box!

PLAY – ORGANIZED AND ORDERLY

Play is practice. 

Play is simulation. 

It aptly activates children's brains, 

but it is not innocent.

 
Games, toys and children's equipment are designed to incorporate and promote certain skills. The little girl nurtures her piece of plastic and dresses it in pink, while the child in blue is caught up in a simulation of war or the act of driving his 3-inch metal car.
 
Fortunately, gender-neutral modes of play do exist, too. The outdoor playground, with its jungle gyms and monkey bars, originates from Germany and is in use worldwide today. The playground is, ultimately, a version of the man-made park: nature reconstructed in city space, tamed, shrunk and adapted to the needs of us humans. It is safe and restricted, usually fenced and physically differentiated from other public spaces. In all its ostensible freedom and good-willed simulations of nature, it is still a venue of control.

When childhood is understood as a passing chapter in life, it is appropriate to shove this short, mental play phase into physical areas of acting out needs and developments necessary for leading a successful life. Let us cage and control the conformist little monkeys! Let's program them to learn how to climb an aluminium igloo in the city centre, to try rock climbing on an apathetic mini mountain made of small square stones. Most importantly, let us Keep An Eye On Them.

”City streets are unsatisfactory playgrounds for children because of the danger, because most good games are against the law, because they are too hot in summer, and because in crowded sections of the city they are apt to be schools of crime.” (Theodore Roosevelt, 1907.)

Play, isolated and categorized like this, is sadly separated from adulthood and from inspiring public spaces not designed exclusively for it. Thus, play is accidentally deprived of important forms of freedom and healthy anarchy. It begins to lack life. 

Amsterdam 2011

Amsterdam 2011

Helsinki 2011

Amsterdam 2011