https://www.newyorker.com/culture/photo-booth/curran-hatlebergs-florida-past-and-future
Sullenly, weeds (aftermath for sure) engulf graveyards or littered lanes, though a single insect, a mantis, provides some bemusement as it clings to a woman’s hand. The atmosphere is weary, post-consumerish. No one seems to possess anything. The men and boys are often shirtless, the cars cannibalized. There is beer, and there are bees bearding the faces of men; there is a peeling painted sign offering honey, but there is no honey. There is a picnic, but only watermelon is being served. Carved on the wooden bench is the old, rude, familiar greeting. An ice chest harbors only ice. No one is eating anything or making anything or going anywhere.
…
The lack of a door is not much different than the doors elsewhere depicted—the busted and broken ones, their screens keeping nothing out and nothing in, the boarded-up ones.
…
It is forgotten without ever being quite remembered. Lives can be lived without practice, without involvement or necessity. This is what Hatleberg’s patient eye discloses. Our celebrations have become obscure, our works enervated, our habitations derelict. The plastic flowers adorning our graves have been found to be not so pretty and enduring after all.
…..
Wow. There are poor places in New England but at least there is a sense of the past or a return to nature or brooding time of prior economic activity.
Florida dereliction looks 100x worse.
Rust belt at least had bones that stayed up when everything else is crumbling. Detroit Is not this bad.