November Photo Challenge: Where The Streets Have No Names

Sooooo, PJ gave us an easy prompt for October…photographer’s choice. Now, he’s swung the pendulum completely the other direction with November’s prompt….Where The Streets Have No Names. Whaaat? I’ve racked my brain all month to come up with a unique and a different perspective. It was definitely a challenge!

So here’s my thought process on deconstructing the prompt….scary, I know, but stay with me…….

Streets are areas that adjoin buildings and providing a passage for travel. Streets also intersect with each other, and their main function is to promote interaction. Streets facilitate unrestricted transport of people and goods.

Okay, now on to the second half….No Name. In many cultures, a name carried with it significant importance or power. No name is synonymous with anonymous. No identification or identity. Insignificant.

Now that we have that all cleared up, here are my five interpretations of Where The Streets Have No Names:

1. Our church participates in a program that provides backpacks filled with essentials for children who will enter the foster care system over the next year or so. Sometimes they enter with only the clothes on their backs and nothing else. Each pack is gender/size specific and include pants, shirt, pajamas, toothbrush/toothpaste, socks, underwear, water bottles, hair care products and accessories, lovey or stuffed animal (for the younger ones), a journal, photo album and bible. In total, more than 400 backpacks were returned for distribution. By anonymously (no names) donating these items, the backpacks intersect with a very disadvantaged population and offers unrestricted transfer of goods. A week after collection, about 39 of them had already been given to children.

2. Some streets are so neglected, they really don’t look like streets. This one looks like a road to nowhere. There is no identification on this road and no one would mistake it for having any significant importance.

3. My imagination can take me just about anywhere I want to go….and the streets there don’t have to have any names. I can navigate from one idea to another quite easily…without any need for a GPS or map. I’m really more of a mind-mapping type of personality anyway. All roads lead to creativity.

4. The classroom is filled with avenues to interact and intersect with learning opportunities to promote interaction. Each child travels a different street to success and, in a perfect environment, there are no labels or names on this journey. FYI, this is Peanut’s kindergarten class. It was “pink day.”

5. Perhaps the best metaphor for Where The Streets Have No Names is the comparison to the Kingdom of God, or in layman’s terms; heaven. It’s there where it doesn’t matter what street you live on….there is no wrong side of the tracks or bad parts of town.  You won’t be able to assume a person’s status or wealth by their street address. Poetically, all “streets” are golden (aka: precious) and point to one destination….the presence of God.

If you’re still with me, here’s a little bonus based on the last interpretation.

Check out how others interpreted PJ’s theme this month HERE.