by Alyssa Bella

Created on: April 18, 2009

In the legislative building where I work, there is a long hall gallery. Here, old black and white photographs hang as a testament to backs broken and lives sweated away building a dream that someone, somewhere called foolishness.

When I am feeling less than inspired, I detour on the way to my office and walk this hall.The photographs do not change, but I do.And so, with each passing I am introduced to someone new.

Yesterday I stopped before the picture of a young man."1909," the only descriptor appeared in small black type below the shot.
The man in the photograph sits on a large slab of marble, sleeves rolled up, pants torn, and face in his hands as he leans forward, so that disheveled hair and defeated posture are all that is visible. If the photo had been in colour, it may have been easier to discern just how thick the coat of sweat and dust.

I found myself wondering the name of this young man. What had been his route to the Canadian prairies? Could his posture be explained by the physical exhaustion and heat alone or perhaps an ailment of different origin, an ailment of the spirit or of the heart?Did he survive to have children, and do his Great Grandchildren now walk the streets of this prairie city that he helped to build?

Hanging nameless on the wall, it is most likely that his people have no idea about the quiet conversations I share with him in this gallery. I stood, staring more intently at the photograph, half expected the man to raise his head and answer my questions. No more than a moment had passed.I walked on, down the hall and turned the corner that leads to my office.

Six o'clock and the day's fury had nearly succeeded in erasing the disheveled hair and defeated posture from my mind.But, flipping the lights in my office and exiting into the magnificent marble rotunda of the building, the man returned to my thoughts. Many dreams are built on broken days, I consider and this quiet truth brings a smile.
I vow to visit "1909" on my broken days. The grandest of dreams stumble and fall and labour through thick coats of sweat and dust before any ribbon cutting ceremony can be planned. Somehow I feel better. Better about what little I had accomplished that day in the direction of a dream.A dream, that someone somewhere has almost certainly called foolishness.This week I found inspiration in a black and white photograph, in the exhausted posture of a man I'll not meet, and in the whispering wisdom of yesterday's elaborate marble dreams realized.

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