Archival Absurdity

March 22, 2024 Posted by: Matthew Brittin

IPM Irrationality

Weird spot, way up there in the corner, are you a bug? If so, do you plan to damage the fabric here? The collection has a significant amount of clothing for the GGNRA. Hundreds of years of historic textiles that clothed the past. Please do not be a moth.
How can I make the spot move, or am I overzealous in guessing that you are an intruder intent on harming these clothes? Wait, is the spot moving or is that my imagination? No, I swear it moved. Was it a flutter so that I can positively say you must be a moth?  
Part of the GGNRA Clothing Collection
I’m reminded of other moths’ hindwing dust trails left across glue leading to the stuck and lifeless thorax. These trapped wings cause me to question removing you from the ecosystem against the value of protecting the history from your damage.  But this ecological ethical quandary is quickly replaced and forgotten by my own enthrallment that this trap has caught you (Yay). If only the collection wasn’t such a delicious buffet for such creatures. Maybe we need tiny ‘restaurant closed’ signs written in moth? Is there moth writing? Would they read it?  
Individual Pieces from the collection
 The spot in the corner moves, for real this time! Stretched out and showing its full eight-legged glory. A sigh of relief, the cloths live on, undisturbed. I send an imagined high five to the spider, as I wish it luck on it hunt for a moth (I hope), while also wondering which leg it would high five me back with. That eight-legged silent assistant to the archive, it can save this clothing history better than any trap I set. I’ll just turn the light out now before I start to question whether the spider being here is a good thing. At least that weird spot way up in the corner wasn’t a moth. 

CollectionProtection, ArchivalInsanity, ParkArchivesand Records Center, GGNRA, GoldenGate, MothVSpider



Last updated: March 22, 2024

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