Wash Away the Rain

Black Hole photographed for the first time.

The first photograph of a Black Hole, once called a Frozen Star
(Event Horizon Telescope April 10, 2019)

Black Holes and the Pale Blue Dot: Creation and Destruction

Black holes are so dense and have such strong gravity that anything that crosses their threshold — known as the event horizon — gets pulled into them, never to return. That includes both matter and light, making them black and invisible.
(Nicole Mortillaro, CBC News, April 10, 2019)

By no means can I hope to comprehend the heavens above and below. The universe is all around in all places, all beings, all creation, void or filled. And yet with today’s first image of a black hole and refracted words from Chris Cornell swimming within my person, our world, this place is mixed within all my thoughts, my words for all today.

Earth as seen from Space.

Earth as seen from Space.
(Wiki Image)

If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe.
(Carl Sagan, Astronomer)

From pale blue dot to black hole I linger this day…thinking about the more of creation, how action and reaction, occurrence and consequence enfilades our lives. And though today is for celebration (an achievement) my day is also gnawed upon with the pulsating drone of Soundgarden refracted throughout my musings…Black Hole Sun Won’t You Come and Wash Away the Rain. Black Hole Sun Won’t You Come Won’t You Come.

Black Hole Sun.

Promotional illustration Black Hole Sun.
Written by Soundgarden frontman Chris Cornell
(1994)

Never to return, we have seen the unseen…light, dark…wisdom from science…Sagan, Oppenheimer, Einstein, too many for me to grasp. Though the day brings to me the wonderment of all creation it is refracted by our appetite for destruction…the less of creation. Within science there is achievement, but so too there is destruction.  The event horizon of two atomic bombs whose mushroom clouds live deep in our chaos…What if we set the sky on fire? asked the scientists…or of a lone Piper on a Great War field of battle:

My Dear Mother, This is not a war at all. It’s scientific slaughter.
(From the letters of Piper James Cleland Richardson V.C.)

Let us hope that the darkness of our science; Gatlings, Mines, Shrapnel, Vickers and Maschinegewehrs, Chlorine and Mustard gases, V1s, V2s, Kamikazes, Fatman, Little Boy, Napalm, Agent Orange, Weaponized Bacteria and so many more that we do not become our own self-inflicted black hole (sun), all consuming, densely filled with our fragments, never to return..black and invisible.

Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.
(J. Robert Oppenheimer, Theoretical Physicist,
Wartime Head Los Alamos Laboratory, Manhattan Project)

Atomic Bomb Nagasaki.

The mushroom cloud formed by the detonation of the atomic bomb “Fatman” on Nagasaki, Japan, August 9, 1945.
(Wiki Image)

The release of atomic power has changed everything except our way of thinking…the solution to the problem lies in the heart of mankind. If only I had known. I should have become a watchmaker.
(Albert Einstein, Theoretical Physicist, 1945)


About The Author

pferguson
Paul has worked with the Paradigm Motion Picture Company since 2009 as producer, historian and research specialist. Paul first met Casey and Ian WIlliams of Paradigm in April 2007 at Ieper (Ypres), Belgium when ceremonies were being held for the re-dedication of the Vimy Memorial, France. Paul's sensitivity to film was developed at an early age seeing his first films at RCAF Zweibrucken, Germany and in Sardinia. Paul returned to Canada in 1967 and was further amazed by David Lean's "Lawrence of Arabia" and "Bridge on the River Kwai". Film captivated Paul and with time he became increasingly interested in storytelling, content development, character, direction, cinematography and soundtracks. At the University of Victoria, Paul studied and compared Japanese and Australian film and became interested in Australian film maker Peter Weir and his film "Gallipoli" (1981). Paul was entranced when he learned Weir had visited the beaches, ridges and ravines of the peninsula. The film "Gallipoli" alone led Paul on many journeys to sites of conflict in England, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany, Malta, Hawaii, Gallipoli and Salonika. It was, however, when Paul watched documentary filmmaker Ken Burns, "The Civil War", that Paul understood how his own experience and insight could be effective and perhaps influential in film-making. Combining his knowledge of Museums and Archives, exhibitions and idea strategies with his film interests would be a natural progression. Paul thinks like a film-maker. His passion for history and storytelling brings to Paradigm an eye (and ear) to the keen and sensitive interests of; content development, the understanding of successful and relational use of collections, imagery and voice. Like Paul's favorite actor, Peter O'Toole, he believes in the adage “To deepen not broaden.” While on this path Paul always remembers his grandmother whose father did not return from the Great War and how his loss shaped her life and how her experience continues to guide him.

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