Los Angeles Smog
From the dirty side of the coin, with love.
Los Angeles is a perpetual on-ramp.
35 minutes since leaving the curbside pick-up at LAX by bus, and we’ve only made it to the on-ramp for the highway. Standstill traffic. There is a sickly brown cloud hovering in front of the mountain range, which has emerged beyond the concrete. The snowy tops read yellow through the polluted haze. In the distance, the Hollywood sign looks like a small piece of aged masking-tape used to mark the contents of a temporary container, peeling at the edges. The defined visibility of the smog tricks everyone into thinking it’s over there, when really we’re in it.
Up on the elevated road way the city sprawl comes into full view. Everything looks sun bleached, faded, like the acid wash jeans in the back of your closet you never wear but keep incase they come back in style. Again. The American flag is at half mast. Again - or still - it is hard to keep track. Even the palm trees seem faded despite the unseasonably heavy rains that have been pouring down on these dry lands. Like the dusty old car at the end of the street, you could write the initials of your crush, or the suggestive outline of genitalia, in the grime that coats this city.
4pm the sun starts to go down. The traffic started over an hour ago in all directions and it won’t stop until that sun is swallowed by the ocean.
"In the distance, the Hollywood sign looks like a small piece of aged masking-tape used to mark the contents of a temporary container, peeling at the edges." LOVE
I like those photos