Decoding Chaos

Though the Wellmont Theater in Montclair has been open more than a month, renovation mop-up remains.

I'm glad I happened by before the clean-up, because the search for order in disorder is one of photography's great pleasures.

When we find it, are we imposing an order that exists only in our minds?

Or are we revealing an order that is latent but present, waiting to be discovered?

It would be hard to tell those apart.

Perhaps order is inherent in everything, whether we can perceive it or not. This is something we can neither prove nor disprove.

If order is inherent in everything, randomness is an illusion. This doesn't mean everything--or anything--is predetermined. We can never know, though we can believe one way or the other.

Even in a world without randomness, free will roams where it will. Nothing is boring, just harder  to explain.

If order is reassuring, disorder is liberating. If chaos is order in disguise, structure is liberating, and we can have our navels and stare at them too.

Anyway, this was something to think about while walking to the store to buy cat food.

Tags: Montclair | photography