World We Live In

Vienna Court Opera, Vienna, Austria, 1902.

Stoic Japanese orphan, standing at attention having brought his dead younger brother to a cremation pyre, Nagasaki, by Joe O’Donnell 1945.

This photograph was taken by an American photojournalist, Joe O’Donnell, in Nagasaki in 1945.

He recently spoke to a Japanese interviewer about this picture:

“I saw a boy about ten years old walking by. He was carrying a baby on his back. In those days in Japan, we often saw children playing with their little brothers or sisters on their backs, but this boy was clearly different. I could see that he had come to this place for a serious reason. He was wearing no shoes. His face was hard. The little head was tipped back as if the baby were fast asleep.

“The boy stood there for five or ten minutes. The men in white masks walked over to him and quietly began to take off the rope that was holding the baby. That is when I saw that the baby was already dead. The men held the body by the hands and feet and placed it on the fire.

“The boy stood there straight without moving, watching the flames. He was biting his lower lip so hard that it shone with blood. The flame burned low like the sun going down. The boy turned around and walked silently away.”

Quaint second hand book store in Versailles.

Officer's ID Card.

Suicide Warning Signs

Vogue Korea, December 2011, Song Hye Kyo by Oh Joong Seok.

Michelle Williams by Chris Heath for GQ, February 2012

There is a question I have been wanting to understand the answer to, but have been feeling that I simply can’t ask. Eventually I just ask it anyway:

Do you think there was a part of you that imagined the two of you would somehow end up together?

Immediately, I wish that I hadn’t. The look on her face—a kind of juddering visceral alarm at what has been said…I don’t wish to see that look many more times in my life. “That would make me way too sad to answer,” she says quickly, and I hurriedly begin another question, about something completely different, hoping that if I say it fast enough these new words will chase the old words away from where they are hanging in the air between us, and maybe she will let me pretend that it was something I never said.

“No, no,” she says, and I can see the tears forming, and I think she means that she doesn’t want to answer any more questions about anything. I mutter some kind of apology under my breath.

But, even now, I’m wrong about everything. Mostly she is just trying to stop my new question. She has something to tell me.

“No,” she says. “I said it would make me too sad to answer but it’s also…”—and she nods even as her voice breaks once more with tears—”…one of my favorite things to imagine.” And through the tears, a beaming, almost beatific smile stretches room-wide across her face. “It’s actually one of my favorite places to visit.”

LZ Lambeau event in Green Bay to honor the Vietnam vets that were never properly welcomed home after thier tours of duty.

This was one Gold Star mother being helped by another Gold Star mother as she found her son’s name on the wall. I know its not the same as him coming home, but it takes my breath away when I think of the amazing dignity and grace this woman showed when they interviewed her. She even took her place on one of the motorcycles for the honor ride where over 1200 men and women rode to signify the number of wisconsin soldiers that never made it home.

The scene, part of the “Walk a Mile in her Shoes” event, was a sight to behold. Soldiers and civilians, mostly male, strapped on flashy red high heels and pushed strollers or carried their children in backpacks. Battle buddies teetered clumsily, holding onto each other for physical and even moral support.

Little sweet elephant.

A soldier in Iraq watch his baby born via webcam.

A tiger mother lost her cubs from premature labour. Shortly after she became depressed and her health declined, and she was diagnosed with depression. So they wrapped up piglets in tiger cloth, and gave them to the tiger. The tiger now loves these pigs and treats them like her babies.

Coco Chanel.