Do you see the water and watch it flow and float an empty shell?

[sovay]

I just found out that my all-time favorite of the Smithsonian's exhibits, "Life in the Ancient Seas," ceased to exist in 2013. The fossil halls are being completely remodeled. It looks like a considerable, thoughtful undertaking. It is probably even scientifically necessary. At the moment I'm too stunned to appreciate it. I loved the fossil skeletons swimming before the full-scale murals of which they were the stony echoes, the shadowiness of its corridors and the sea-lighting, the petrified corals and the shells. The diorama of the Paleozoic reef. I wanted to swim in those waters, all the different millions of years of them. Ammonites, mosasaurs, armored fishes, euryptids, dugongs and diving birds and kelp swaying in the bubble-blue light. In 2005, I rejoiced that it still existed. I wish I had known in time to say goodbye.

[edit] Ely Kish, the painter of the murals, died last year. She gave me a wonderful dream of the sea's deep time. I would have preferred not to learn both of these facts within the same half-hour.

Comments

[larryhammer]

Ah, man. My favorite Smithsonian exhibit as well. I remember when it went in, because I hadn't been convinced that anything could be better than the life-sized blue whale that had been in that space and was AMAZED at how much better ancient life was than ocean life. During those mid-teen years when I was too young for a summer job, I spent a lot of summer days haunting the Mall-side Smithsonians, and that was one of the places I always went.

---L.

[sovay]

Ah, man. My favorite Smithsonian exhibit as well.

Oh, I'm sorry. I envy your opportunity to haunt the Smithsonian. I can still count the number of times I've been there on a hand and a half.

[larryhammer]

It was one of the distinct pluses of growing up in the District.

---L.