Comments
As Above, So Below

Lynne

It looks as if this were taken from inside an open gravesite.

Location: Mount Rose Cemetery  Gallery: Rookery

Ascension

Lynne

Very somber.

Location: Mount Rose Cemetery  Gallery: Rookery

Valley

Lynne

Absolutely spectacular!

Location: Mount Rose Cemetery  Gallery: Rookery

Flight

Lynne

Sked,

My thought exactly!

Location: Mount Rose Cemetery  Gallery: Rookery

Cemented In

Lynne

Definitely a howling face. Definitely.

Location: Mount Rose Cemetery  Gallery: Rookery

Snowblind

Lynne

In the Victorian and Edwardian eras an anchor (usually with a chain) was used to represent one of the three cardinal virtues of Christianity - hope. The other two were faith (cross) and love/charity (heart).

Location: Mount Rose Cemetery  Gallery: Rookery

Fountain

Lynne

Ab fab!

Location: Mount Rose Cemetery  Gallery: Rookery

Parents

Lynne

Beautiful!

Time for some fresh heir? ;-)

Location: Mount Rose Cemetery  Gallery: Rookery

Rusting Casket

Lynne

A+++++ for the colors and lighting!

Location: Mount Rose Cemetery  Gallery: Rookery

Across the Way

Lynne

Symmetry and colors are great. This is actually a quite complex shot.

Location: Mount Rose Cemetery  Gallery: Rookery

Gracefully Suspended

Lynne

It's odd - this is real, but it looks like a stage set for a movie.

Location: Mount Rose Cemetery  Gallery: Rookery

Aisle

Lynne

I love your angle on this shot. It looks like it would take a lot of hard work to get up the aisle.

Location: Mount Rose Cemetery  Gallery: Rookery

Table

Lynne

Location: Clairvaux Tuberculosis Hospital  Gallery: Gray Skies

Summer Days

Lynne

Location: Severalls Hospital  Gallery: The Beginning of the End

Pit Of Oblivion

Lynne

[Psssstttt!!!!! Marcia!!!!! Should we tell anyone? ;-) ]

http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2008/03/07/neither-black-nor-white/

Location: Pennhurst State School  Gallery: The Sadness

Clean

Lynne

Location: Ypsilanti State Hospital  Gallery: Occupational Hazards

Master Electrode Selector

Lynne

Mad Dawg, you are a hoot! :-)

Location: Haverford State Hospital  Gallery: SSDD

Tub

Lynne

And the things you did to try to stop this from happening were . . . . . ?

Location: Dever State School  Gallery: Institutional

Washdown

Lynne

If you did not work to stop the punitive behavior you say you observed, then you were certainly never guilty of treating anyone with love or dignity.

Location: Dever State School  Gallery: Institutional

Ugly

Lynne

There have always been agencies to which employees were required to report suspected and/or observed abuse and/or neglect. This has been a law for many years, and was certainly the case in the 1980s. You never even have had to give your name if you preferred.

I too would have a bad conscience if I had seen all that you say you saw and yet never stepped forward, even anonymously, to try to help. That is where the forgiveness needs to go first - for your reluctance to try to help - even anonymously - helpless people you say you believe were being hurt.

And if you have information that you could now put forward - with evidence to support your charges - and even though many years have passed - there are people out there who would work to try to see justice done or at least prevent these same staff from working with people who can't defend themselves.

Whining for mercy anonymously as an afterthought for not having tried to intervene doesn't do much to set you right in the world. If I were you I'd be a bit more worried about my own "soul" than that of innocent people - only an uncaring, cold deity would turn away from innocent people who had been harmed by others.

Spiritual ramblings aside, walk the walk if you are going to talk the talk. Anyone can come on here and claim they saw abuse or neglect, but if you saw it, tolerated it, didn't report it, and refused to go to someone who could have done something about it - then you are in the exact same boat as the people you are complaining about.

Location: Dever State School  Gallery: Institutional

Safety Bathroom

Lynne

These are great devices to assist someone with limited mobility so they can pull themselves upright to stand at the sink. This gives them the opportunity to use the mirrors and increases their personal image because they aren't limited to a single plane in space - what they can see from a seated level. There is a lot of research that shows that people in wheelchairs (with or without other issues) are not treated the same as people out of wheelchairs because people bend DOWN to look at them. Increasing the person's "height" increases their interaction opportunities and their ability to interact more "normally" in their environment. If you put all the fixtures at wheelchair level you are assuming the person can never leave their wheelchair, and there are LOTS of people who can stand for short periods of time if they have a way to get themselves up and/or down in their chairs.

Of course, if you keep looking long enough for something bad, you're bound to find it. :-)

Location: Pennhurst State School  Gallery: Forgotten

Pit Of Oblivion

Lynne

Someone - shoot me now. :-)

Funny how this particular picture, which we know for certain was drawn by staff, inspires people who know nothing about the world of DD to write in and make comments showing their own bizarre yet naive conceptions about how other peoples' lives are or were.

I'm thinking something or someone needs to be taken with a grain of salt. ;-)

Bad psychopharmacological pun - sorry.

Location: Pennhurst State School  Gallery: The Sadness

Rusting Tubs

Lynne

Jeebers, what is this bizarre, morbid fascination with ice in the bath water, people? Look at your basic physiology - you can't survive more than a VERY short time (under an hour) in a bathtub full of iced water. It would kill you. Any water that is below body temperature FEELS cold, even room temperature water, so when people talked about being in "ice cold water" for long periods of time they could NOT mean it literally - it's a perceptual issue - it feels cold in comparison - you can't really be in ice water for more than a few minutes or you would die - sorry - ack! - not real life - TV - movie - fantasy - fiction - pretend . . . . . . . . . .

[thump thump thump]

Location: Ypsilanti State Hospital  Gallery: Occupational Hazards

Whoops

Lynne

The fact that you admit to being so "curious" to read people's personal medical files when these folks were at a damned rough point in their lives - just to prove your own personal point - is exactly why HIPAA laws were enacted - to keep people who have no connection with the person involved from rooting through their records.

Location: Cliffside Hospital  Gallery: Secret Things

Metal Martian

Lynne

We are an exceptionally clean group.

http://www.opacity.us/...rotting_bathroom.htm

Location: Stella Artois Brewery  Gallery: Pure Inebriation