Statement for heartland
an installation
by Nichole DeMent & Stephen Rock at Rock|DeMent
in Seattle
October
/ November 2008
I want my coffee in the morning, just around the corner, I want my dentist, my doctor, my lawyer, my banker and a Home Depot there too, open 24/7/365, I want to get there easy, fast and ready to haul a load, I want cheap goods made good and all the goods all the time, every time, I want a big house, with a pool and a shop and a view and a four car garage, with room for the kids, room for the mother in law, for the games, for the toys, for the TV, the pool table, the weight room and sauna, a big barbecue on a big deck with a canopy for the hot weather and a heater for the cold, I want a nice ride with some cool rims, a mountain bike for playin and a dvd player for watchin, I want an iPhone, an iPod, an iMac and some smokin internet, I want the fastest, biggest, coolest, the goddamn greatest there is because:
I'm an American and that's what I want.
But then again, what I really like are big skies, blue skies, great big clean blue skies, with eagles flying, bears growling and lots of room to move, I like clear waters and big clean lakes with lots of fish, I'd like to know there are still polar bears floating on ice and that the Amazon isn't burning, I'd like a place of peace and quiet, where we don't want more than we need and we preserve what we've got, where we know when we have enough and when to stop tearing up the heartland for more shopping malls and subdivisions.
If I only wanted less....