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The Parkways Projects 1934≈2025
The Parkways Projects 1934≈2025
@parkwaysprojects.bsky.social
1 year ago
1963 Impala, 1969 Camper at campsite D16, Julian Price State Park. This Kodak Instamatic photograph is of a car & pop-up camper against a dark olive-black forest made at the start of a rain soaked weekend. It’s why the canvas is sagging, for it was saturated by the time I took this photograph. I was a 13 year old agnostic of two years, formerly Methodist & thoroughly soaked to the skin on a cold August gloaming off the Blue Ridge Parkway. I considered this its baptism—would it welcome me back inside? Before this drenching, I would swear it had no religion. The cardinal rule was to not touch the inner surface of the canvas. Or the great flood would come. It may seem I have a theme but not by plan. Nor any commandment to the best of my recollection. It’s easy to remember what three full days & nights plus a few extra hours of drenching rains does to the spirit when camping. 1963 Chevrolet Impala. Dark metallic brown. White top, painted, not vinyl. 1969 Coleman pop-up tent camper. A beautiful golden maple brown. 1969 at Julian Price State Park, North Carolina. Campsite D16. I’ve since camped in that site four more times over 54 years of my life. On the last trip to the Parkway in October of 2023 I learned it was slated for retirement due to the narrow pullout space & steep walk down into the campsite. Due to Fate, fortune & climate change, I still don’t know if D-16 still exists. If no, then a part of myself will not exist. Even under brilliant sunlight, even if 6,000 miles away from this place. In August 2019, August & October 2023, it rained during, but not throughout my stays there. In 1972 I remember being in this site for a full week. It was only me, the first year of no more family vacations. It did not rain once. I was there two nights in 2019; gone at daybreak. Two nights in 2022. sne night in October 2023. In all my dreams, I would never have considered this site, this campground, this Parkway to ever become decommissioned.

1963 Impala, 1969 Camper at campsite D16, Julian Price State Park. This Kodak Instamatic photograph is of a car & pop-up camper against a dark olive-black forest made at the start of a rain soaked weekend. It’s why the canvas is sagging, for it was saturated by the time I took this photograph. I was a 13 year old agnostic of two years, formerly Methodist & thoroughly soaked to the skin on a cold August gloaming off the Blue Ridge Parkway. I considered this its baptism—would it welcome me back inside? Before this drenching, I would swear it had no religion. The cardinal rule was to not touch the inner surface of the canvas. Or the great flood would come. It may seem I have a theme but not by plan. Nor any commandment to the best of my recollection. It’s easy to remember what three full days & nights plus a few extra hours of drenching rains does to the spirit when camping. 1963 Chevrolet Impala. Dark metallic brown. White top, painted, not vinyl. 1969 Coleman pop-up tent camper. A beautiful golden maple brown. 1969 at Julian Price State Park, North Carolina. Campsite D16. I’ve since camped in that site four more times over 54 years of my life. On the last trip to the Parkway in October of 2023 I learned it was slated for retirement due to the narrow pullout space & steep walk down into the campsite. Due to Fate, fortune & climate change, I still don’t know if D-16 still exists. If no, then a part of myself will not exist. Even under brilliant sunlight, even if 6,000 miles away from this place. In August 2019, August & October 2023, it rained during, but not throughout my stays there. In 1972 I remember being in this site for a full week. It was only me, the first year of no more family vacations. It did not rain once. I was there two nights in 2019; gone at daybreak. Two nights in 2022. sne night in October 2023. In all my dreams, I would never have considered this site, this campground, this Parkway to ever become decommissioned.

🌙🦉 #TheParkwaysProjects A multi-tiered photo essay to come in three arenas: a Substack/Patreon/Bluesky trio.

A sliver of space amid torrents of rain, #TomOgburn #photography #JulienPriceSP #PhotographersOfBlueSky #BlueskyArt #Skyart #photos #camping
#EastCoastKin 🦋 #ArtYear #KodakInstamatic 4️⃣ALT⬇️

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