Museum log

Yesterday I went to the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago with my two boys and my friend Ron. It's an awesome museum, and it was packed. In addition to January offering free admission and it being a holiday weekend for school kids, it was also Boy Scout day. A few random thoughts on the exhibits that drew our attention the most.

The farm exhibit boasts an eight row combine with a cutaway to the thresher and engine. Boys will be boys, and they stood in line for a while to be able to climb into the operator's compartment and give the wheel a turn or two. The technology in farming these days is amazing: gps, yield monitors and counters, capacity in general. It was even more interesting because Ron grew up on a farm and is a corn scientist. We got a lot of the back story.

A full scale train layout that included a replica of downtown Chicago was also a hit. The model took us from Chicago out to Seattle and back. One thing we noticed about the layout was the absence of church buildings, especially in the small towns that you know have at least three churches at the town square!! Was not having churches an oversight or intentional?

Another fascinating exhibit is the U-505 German sub exhibit from WWII. I am a pacifist, radically opposed to war and passionate about finding non-violent resolution to conflict. So I look at the exhibit perhaps a little differently than many people. What I see in the exhibit is the brute force of war, the absolutely destructive power of this machine which was built solely for the purpose of destruction. Entering the exhibit area there is a wall which shows all the merchant ships destroyed during a five year period or so. There were hundreds of vessels sunk. I wonder about the people on those vessels, the lives impacted by their loss, the economies affected, the horrors of war. Of course there are people all around the world today that can testify to those WWII horrors and the contemporary horrors of war. One tension for me is that I do find the technology fascinating: how the vessel works, how the crew lived in it, and the process for getting the U-505 into its current museum space is a testimony to will-power, creativity, and technical skill.

My ten year old son Noah showed me how a techno-kid goes through the world. He played his gameboy in the van on the way to the museum. Then he gravitated to every interactive exhibit with a computer screen. One of his favorites was actually the room with race car and skiing simulators. He would have spent hours in there, a place which to me was best described as a game room! Then on the way home he figured out some things on my new phone that I was having trouble with.

Finally, at 4:00 p.m. the museum closed and we headed to the van. We were on the bottom level of the submerged garage. We sat in noxious fumes for almost exactly an hour before exiting. We were an hour late to meet our wives and daughters, and without cell-phone reception they were a little worried when we finally got to open air. But it also made a great case study in human behavior. Most people sat patiently in their vehicles, inching up as the opportunity presented itself and creating space for others to merge. Some people got out of their cars and tried to see what the delay was by walking up the exit ramp - frustration was evident on their faces. At one point a few people started blowing their horns, then a few more added in, then an all-out symphony was created on the spot. The pickup truck in front of us showed its displeasure by burning rubber on the way out the exit gate. Now there really could/should have been a better design for moving that many cars; but come on! How we deal with adversity, and what we understand as real adversity, are questions worth pondering.....