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March 8, 2015 by tomdalzell

By which we measure

 

My favorite musical lyric with the word “measure” is from John Lennon – “God is the concept / by which we measure our pain.”

4417 Baltimore Avenue, Philadelphia

Peter Korn and Kevin Gray and I shared a first-floor flat at 4417 Baltimore Avenue in West Philadephia for the 1970-1971 school year.  Peter and I were American Civilization majors.  Kevin was an Architecture major.  I think.  Maybe Art History?

Music informed our lives, at least Peter’s and my lives. Vietnam swirled around us, never not in the air.  We needed to be informed.

220px-JLPOBCover

We listened to the first Lennon/Ono album a lot.  “God” informed us.  It was informing me in a large way when John was killed.  He sings “The dream is over.”  In December 1980 our dream of working for the United Farm Workers for our whole lives was over and it was not clear what was next.

How sad.

Let’s put that away and take a look at things by which we measure.

We measure time. Our theme song for measuring time could be “Time Waits for No One” by the Rolling Stones, “Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?” by Chicago Transit Authority, or “Time Passes Slowly” by Bob Dylan.  They are all good songs.  But I go elsewhere:

1292006853_chambers-brothers

Berkeley has several iconic (HATE that word – WHY DO I USE IT?) clocks.

SONY DSC

This is Obata’s 1939 water color of Sather Tower – aka – the Campanille.   And then downtown, on the 2200 block of Shattuck:

"Quirky Berkeley"

In Cesar Chavez Park there is a mounded solar clock:

Berkeleyside Photo: Chris Benton

Berkeleyside Photo: Chris Benton

Moving to residential (mostly), a common day clock, gifted to the street:

818 Addison

818 Addison

Measuring time is consummately arbitrary, but there are other ways to measure time than a mechanical clock, and we have them.

Malcolm X School playground

Malcolm X School playground

1010 Sierra

1010 Sierra

And the quirkiest of all, on campus, the topiary sundial shown here as tear gas is applied:

Photo: Berkeley Tribe

Photo: Berkeley Tribe

We measure the temperature, and let the street know.

2645 Shasta

2645 Shasta

2335 5th

2335 5th

2320 6th

2320 6th

We measure weight.  There is only one possible song here.

music-from-big-pink-5278ac8cda60b

A song that has not grown old for me, even now 46 years later.

1188 Oxford

1188 Oxford

722 Spruce

722 Spruce

722 Spruce

722 Spruce

And we measure something with this:

521 Vincente

521 Vincente

I must go back to Vincente and (a) get a better photo and (b) figure out what this is.  Clock?  I don’t get the lettering.

I showed the photos to my friend, who was busy going through a London-Bridge-in- Arizona postcard collection that Gabby had just sent him.  Richly absurd!

What about the measuring devices as shown in the photos?

IMG_3677

 

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