A few nice photo share images I found:
I Miss Playing in the Sand
Image by Keoni Cabral
Aloha Nephew. I hope you're reading this when you are older and can fully understand what I say to you now:
I really, really wanted to share this moment of You. Because you remind me so much of myself when I was a keiki: same coloring, similar hair, similar smile. Same soft spirit. In fact, I played on this very same soft, warm sand at Waimea Beach Park when I stood at your height! Your Gramma used to drive your mom, your Uncle Keo, and your Uncle Kalani halfway around the island in our dimpled, gray primer painted '63 VW Bug, beach chairs in tow (no air conditioning to blow), so we could frolic at just about the same spot you're pictured here, crouched and ready to fly high.
It was my favorite beach in all the world at a time when every beach was my favorite beach in all the world. And so that's why I wanted to post this photo of you, Nephew. But I also wanted it up little pup because it forever captures a special moment on the sweet-salty island home that raised me; and that now mothers you. Because that was an incredible, indelible moment you'll never remember. But I always will.
You were much too young to recall it, with every minute of everyday so full of specialness - - each moment to the next hardly standing out from the rest. But for grown up me, those kinds of moments have come fewer and farther. The distance between high and low, in the many seasons that now seem to just come and go.
Thus, the special times, fleeting or not, I cherish now more than ever. And so, Nephew, this moment From Above, I will never, ever forget. Because you were so free. So full of joy, so full of glee. And it reminded Me. It reminded me of what That was like. And what it should be like. And what it can still be like. And because it reminded me . . . of me . . . when I was you.
It doesn't matter that you will never remember it Nephew. I will. And for this moment from above, I'll always be grateful. More than you could ever know.
With Love,
Your Uncle Keo
P.S: Eat all your broccoli.
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Other short bits from my sets:
- Picture Stories: 6 Words
- Picture Story + [TRUE]
- Picture Story - [FALSE]
- Picture Poetry
101 The Olmsted Vision: Parks, Playgrounds, and Beaches for the Los Angeles Region
Image by The City Project
The Los Angeles Times recently editorialized: "Los Angeles is chronically short of park space, a civic failure that generations of leaders have only glancingly addressed. In 1930, the brilliant but ignored Olmsted-Bartholomew plan envisioned a county where every resident enjoyed easy access to beaches, vistas, recreation areas and parks. Today, just 30% or so of Los Angeles' children live within walking distance of a public place to play, the lowest percentage of any major American city -- and the city is growing denser all the time."
The City Project's maps show the Olmsted proposal for parks, playgrounds, and beaches for the Los Angeles region, compared to the poverty of parks and beaches today.
In 1930, Olmsted Brothers and Bartholomew Associates published the classic report called "Parks, Playgrounds and Beaches for the Los Angeles Region." The Report proposed a comprehensive and coherent network of parks, playgrounds, schools, beaches, forests, and transportation to promote the social, economic, and environmental vitality of Los Angeles and the health of its people. The Olmsted firm was started by the sons of the great landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted, who designed Central Park in New York City and founded the field of landscape architecture. According to the Olmsted-Bartholomew Report in words that remain true today:
"Continued prosperity [in Los Angeles] will depend on providing needed parks, because, with the growth of a great metropolis here, the absence of parks will make living conditions less and less attractive, less and less wholesome. . . . In so far, therefore, as the people fail to show the understanding, courage, and organizing ability necessary at this crisis, the growth of the Region will tend to strangle itself."
The report proposed:
*the shared use of parks and schools,
*greening the Los Angeles and San Gabriel Rivers,
*doubling beach access
*using parks and school fileds for clean water and flood control
*including forests in the park system
*transportation to parks, schools, rivers, beaches, mountains, and forests.
The Report recognized that low income communities should receive first consideration in parks and recreation because they often live in less desirable areas, and have fewer leisure opportunities. The Report recognized that a balanced park and recreation system serves diverse needs, including active and passive recreation. The Report recommended creating a regional park authority with power to raise funds to acquire and develop parks and other natural public places.
Each of these recommendations remains valid today.
Implementing the Olmsted vision would have made Los Angeles one of the most beautiful and livable regions in the world. Civic leaders killed the Report because of politics, bureaucracy, and greed in a triumph of private power over public space and social democracy.
Advocates and activists today are restoring a part of the vision and the lost beauty of Los Angeles through the urban park movement.
Click here to visit the core maps and analyses for the Los Angeles region covering healthy, livable communities for all.
Click here for the The City Project's Policy Report
Healthy Parks, Schools, and Communities: Mapping Green Access and Equity for the Los Angeles Region.
Click here to visit the Olmsted Homestead on The City Project's flickr site.
