This is the 2nd of a 4 part series: Modern-day philosophers discuss the word existential (which is derived from the word existence) in terms of ascribing a meaning to our human existence. Many of the postings Ive made to this web page obliquely approach this question. Those fanciful gnomes I wrote about, for example, who lived in the basements of our city schools and gathered up the chalk dust which once comprised important words or math equations on our classroom blackboards which later became the white lines on the athletic fields was really a commentary on how what was once so important to us eventually turns to dust; in the case of those words written on the blackboard, it does so almost immediately. As those of us here contemplate those things which we once treasured and which have faded away or disappeared entirely from the Wilmington landscape, whether a now-closed school, the remembrance of a beloved corner store and its storekeeper, our memory of a carefree journey on a city bus, or a cop on the beat or a fire fighter who we respected, or our memory of a church where our parents and grandparents knelt to pray, or our recollections of the Brandywine River or one of the local streams where we once waded amidst the rocks, or the numerous playing fields, or even our memories of a particular swimming pool in our city, what we often lament here in this column is our loss of the people, places, and as we remember them now, our fond experience of growing up in Wilmington. Many of those local landmarks held a special meaning for us. Those places provided us with more than simply a fond memory; they were the places which located us in the much wider expanse of the city where, despite our differences, we learned to feel comfortable with one another and with ourselves. Those familiar places where many of us grew up delineated the place where we eventually learned to make our way in the world, whether it was out in the 9th Ward or in the downtown neighborhood which adjoins the Sacred Heart Parish or even, in what was considered then, the fringe area in the vicinity of the train station on Front Street. Those places provided us with our place, not only within the City of Wilmington but gave to our lives a significant part of its structure, as well.
Posted on: Mon, 22 Dec 2014 13:23:42 +0000