The Ragged Future

What does a Depression look like and sound like? Obviously there are the abandoned houses, factories, offices, and stores. But even the occupied buildings are starting to look rougher, and the cars on the road are both looking rougher, and sounding squeakier. Yesterday we saw a first for us: a car with foam insulation blown into holes that rust had made.

We happen to live in a part of the world with a long Winter. A lot of maintenance is deferred over the Winter, and in the Spring things look pretty awful. A Depression is an economic Winter, and a whole lot of maintenance is not going on at present.

As the Depression grinds on for years, things will look pretty ragged. There will be few new cars on the road, and most cars will be rusty and dented. The roads themselves will become ever more potholed, and have grass growing out of cracks in the pavement. Abandoned cars will litter the highways, and twisted guard rails will go unrepaired. There will be more detours due to unsafe bridges, and washed-out culverts.

Occupied houses will go unpainted, with windows cracked or boarded-up, and roofs rotting. Their tenant's clothes will get more frayed, and their hair dishevelled. As government assistance programs become more meagre, people will also become quite lean, and their teeth will show more signs of neglect.

Just as growing old gracefully means accepting one's ageing appearance and avoiding the hair dye and plastic surgery, so growing poorer gracefully will mean choosing one's battles carefully in the fight against pervasive decay. It is best to give up on the idea of having more than a few new things. What you own can be patched, cleaned, and tidied to maintain mere shabbiness instead of decrepitude.

Shabby things can be appreciated as well their new counterparts, perhaps even better - was there a time in your childhood when you had a ratty old blanket that you loved? Newness of things destroys history. Society is entering an era where it will be living with a history which leaves its scratches and stains all around. This heightened experience of time will likely help burn deeper memories in these, the defining years of those now living.