i have taken two thousand, four hundred and forty photos since i came to MIT. my photo album conveniently lists them in chronological order, one after the other, in perfect linear narrative since i first stepped on campus.
but i’ve found, increasingly, that memories don’t work that way. i’ve found that memories don’t often fall in orderly queues aligned with time; they meander and bifurcate and grow into each other. each place on campus and in boston — classrooms, dining halls, dorms, street intersections, parks — evoke moments in the past, or sometimes collections of moments spread over months at a time.
thankfully for us, google photos not only displays its standard chronological view, but also lets you see where you took your photos, in the form of a heat map:
8 photos a day, for around three hundred days
same map, but zoomed in on MIT (the big red cluster in the first picture)
An arrow pointing right
Previous
An arrow pointing right
Next
each cluster on the map — bright red and orange — indicates a spot of high photo density and a clump of memories. here are some of the places that have the most memories:
1. massachusetts ave crossing outside lobby 7
like most students, i made the daily pilgrimage last year from my dorm in the west side of campus to my classes in the east side, and then back again in the afternoon. a pedestrian crossing across mass ave bridges the two sides — possibly the most iconic crossing on campus.
november 7, 2024. the setting sun roughly aligns with the crossing and the infinite corridor in the days before and after mithenge
december 11, 2024
december 24, 2024: my last few moments in boston for the fall semester, hauling a suitcase through fresh snow at 6 am
january 20, 2025
An arrow pointing right
Previous
An arrow pointing right
Next
Read More