Does permanency exist?

Over the weekend, Andrew and I visited the Menil Collection in Houston; if you get a chance, I strongly recommend visiting! Part of the collection includes preserved artifacts from ancient empires, and even some pieces from the paleolithic era. It was incredible to see so many fragments of bowls, tapestries, and sculptures from a time nearly forgotten. Perhaps what really struck me was how well preserved some of them were. Sure, they were a little chipped and showed signs of a few centuries of age. For the most part, though, it was hard to believe how remarkably they had survived. Of course, that led me to an important question of my own: what will be left of our time?

One of today's common complaints is that "they just don't make things like they used to." In today's world, you can expect your new pair of jeans to last maybe a year before holes appear in the knees. You can expect your latest iFill-in-the-Blank-with-the-Latest-Gadget to become obsolete when a new, improved version comes out in a few years. You can expect your car to need more maintenance work sooner than in the past, and you can expect your bachelor's degree to soon be deemed "not enough," in favor of a job candidate with a graduate degree. I won't even venture into the realm of speculating about the political and economic reasons why these things seem to be the case, but I think it's a question worth asking. We've made so much progress; what's the price?

In a few hundred years, will people come to museums to see "what people were like in 2011?" What will they see? What could we possibly display that will still be around, for posterity's sake? Will our poetry and our New York Times best sellers be displayed next to Shakespeare and Dickens?

What do you think? For now, I'm going to revel in some nature - who knows how long until that, too, becomes obsolete.