Gifts from the Future – Steve Eilenberg

  • Lottie with panda
  • Betty, Yucca and Jet
  • Old beach couple with boom box
  • Myrna with rollerblade
  • Earl with riding mower
  • Plasma screen present
  • Invader who?
  • Tommy with gameboy
  • Frank at Jacko’s grave
  • Joey’s new scooter
  • Bob’s Buzz Lightyear
  • I didn’t know it could be this special!
  • Sarah Palin? Nope!
  • Say hello to my little friend
  • Maybel’s got an ipad

Imagine if you could send objects back in time. Naturally, you couldn’t specify what went to whom or how it would be used. What would you choose to send and why? Would you use this technology to clean out your garage and save a trip to the Salvation Army, for laughs, to save the future from a horrible fate, or just to improve our lot?

I recently had to make these difficult choices. All of the items were sent  to Prescott, Arizona (not my choice, but ça va). Marie was not amused when I sent her Ipad away, but it was worth it when I saw Mabel’s face.  Of course, for 70 years, it was used as a kitchen trivet, but one day, when Steve Jobs was visiting his grandmother…

The original source images were acquired in a Prescott, Arizona thrift store. Thousands of family photographs had been removed from their albums and were jumbled together in a slowly disintegrating, vaguely moldy pile. I went through the pile, culling the ones which spoke to me. These were scanned on a high resolution flatbed device, cleaned up and my gifts to the past from our time added electronically.  -steve eilenberg