Ghost towns, abandoned cities, temples dedicated to forgotten gods. They were once home to hundreds, even thousands. What happened? Nature struck–from the volcanic devastation of ancient Pompeii to the complete elimination by wildfire just last week of Greenville, California. Sometimes resources vanish–oil, gold, water. Sometimes human-made disasters occur, leaving us to ask, “What could we have done differently?” Their remains are both poignant warnings and treasured reminders that nothing lasts forever. Except Forever.
Click on any image to enlarge it, or to start slide show.
“Nothing in the world is permanent, and we’re foolish when we ask anything to last. But surely we’re still more foolish not to take delight in it while we have it.”
~W. Somerset Maugham
“The butterfly counts not months but moments, and has time enough.”
~Rabindranath Tagore
“That which is impermanent attracts compassion. That which is not provides wisdom.”
~Stephen Levine
“Nature is a constant reminder of the beauty of consistence, the vanity of arrogance, and the necessity of impermanence.”
~Mokokoma Mokhonoana
“Nothing lasts, except your decision to celebrate everything, everyone, for the beauty that is there within each moment, each smile, each impermanent flicker of infinity.”
~Vironika Tugaleva
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About mitchteemley
Writer, Filmmaker, Humorist, Thinker-about-stuffer
Mitch Teemley 
I live about 100 miles from Greenville. It’s one of many places that are gone or forever changed.
I am constantly amazed and saddened by humanity’s arrogance in the unspoken assumption that everything thing we build is permanent. At best we live a short time and should spend more of or time celebrating what have with the understanding that someday it will pass into history.
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I couldn’t agree more, Andrew.
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It doesn’t take long for nature to reclaim its own.
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About everything from my childhood is gone–hospital where I was born, grade school, farmhouse, grocery store. Surely I’m not THAT old! I’ve commemorated the farmhouse (roller skating was allowed in the back room) in an essay, which Our American Stories has aired, which keeps it alive a little longer.
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Now, that’s the way to do it, Joy!
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Absolutely beautiful photo 👌👌👌📷🖤
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Intriguing photos and quotes, Mitch.
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Pingback: Gone Forever – THE ALTERNATIVE
The photos of Cherynobl are chilling, the children’s nursery in particular.
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Thanks a lot for the reminder,love it as it is truly inspiring .Take care🌹🙏😊
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These pictures are so pretty. You have a raw talent. Keep up the good work. I aspire to travel a lot in the next few years. I just got a new job and so excited to save up for my future trips. Your pictures make me feel like there is so much to look forward to.
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Thank you, Rosy. I hope you take many wonderful trips! Just to be clear: I didn’t take any of these photos, I just gathered and (in some cases) captioned them.
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The older I get the harder to comprehend all that I’ve experienced through the years. Kind of seems like a dream. It is heart breaking to hear that history and lives are being destroyed through these fires. To me sometimes thinking about all that has transpired through history, it’s just mind boggling. Your photos are startling and really makes me stop and think what stories they are trying to tell. Amazing.
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A fascinating share and photos Mitch. Linda Goodman’s book star signs is quite exciting covering many old west ghost towns and saloons came as a surprise to me. Her book Star Signs was not about astrology but ghosts. I want to explore. Have a good weekend!
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You too!
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Nice post and pictures.
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Amazing photos, Mitch. Thanks so much for sharing them! I also love the quotes at the end.
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Such stories behind each of these. Even long gone, I’d still love to visit these sites, and join that fellow for coffee atop that village.
Thanks Mitch, for a bit of mind wandering and spiritual reminder of our temporary world.
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Stonehenge is pretty curious. Not sure if I have missed the news but I’m not sure it has been discovered who built it and why was it built…
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It’s still pretty much a mystery, I believe.
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I enjoyed this post so much! Thank you. Many blessings, Mitch!
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You too, Cindy!
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A plumber once told me: “Nobody’s perfect, and nothing lasts forever. That covers labor and materials.”
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;>)
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Haunting pix and wise quotes, especially from WSM and VT. Here’s my haiga in that spirit:
*Happy Heraclitus*
Life flows and splashes.
No things are permanent and
all things are precious.
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Nice, MC.
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I really feel for the many bone-dry-vegetation areas planetwide uncontrollably burning. As a lifelong resident of southwestern B.C., the unprecedented heatwave here in late June, described by meteorologists as more of a ‘stalling heat dome’, left me feeling I could never again complain about the weather being too cold.
After 54 years of life, I still find that collective human existence has for too long been analogous to a cafeteria lineup consisting of diversely societally represented people, all adamantly arguing over which identifiable person should be at the front and, conversely, at the back of the line. Many of them further fight over to whom amongst them should go the last piece of quality pie and how much they should have to pay for it — all the while the interstellar spaceship on which they’re all permanently confined, owned and operated by (besides the wealthiest passengers) the fossil fuel industry, is on fire and toxifying at locations not normally investigated.
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“Too soon old, too late smart.”
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Well said.
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Love the photos, great article!
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Love the post. As an environmental scientist, you could have also included a picture of the Earth, or of any of the umpteen animal species humans have driven to extinction.
I know that doesn’t sound funny, but I consider myself a humorist also, and have a book of essays coming out soon called Hold the Apocalypse – Pass Me a Scientist Please which hopefully proves it. If interested, check my website for sample essays.
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I will, Bob!
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I was reading in devotions today about this idea — so hard for us humans to get outside the constraints of linear time. Just a bit of what I read from Elizabeth Boyden Howes: “Jesus taught over and over that “today is all there is”…. the Eternal wants response in time, intensity of involvement, and the quality of being… The workers in the field were in linear time; Jesus was speaking in cyclic or eternal time”. Good post and the pictures are good reminders to have hope in God’s timing.
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Wise reflection, Jane. Puts me in mind of Paul’s words in 2 Corinthians 4:18, “…So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.”
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