I’ll expand on this later, but Google Maps and its street view mode, is incredibly handy for scoping out a place ahead of time (assuming the street view is recent enough to be reasonably accurate).
But you can also use it to travel back in time, in a way, by using a slider to select previous street view scenes, some stretching back 12 years. This may not seem very old, but Google itself only existed for eight years prior. It’ll feel like looking at ancient history in a hundred years, when everyone is driving flying cars.
These snapshots in time can also produce a sense of nostalgia or, in my case, a kind of melancholy.
I used street view to travel around my hometown of Duncan. I last lived in Duncan in 1986–32 years ago as I write this–and while I’ve visited numerous times since then, the frequency of the trips has dwindled over the years and my last visit was in 2011. So I turned to street view to see how it looks now.
Some things are virtually unchanged. The Duncan Lanes bowling alley is still there. All of the schools I went to are still standing, though some have been repurposed. But other things are gone. The 2009 street view shows the small building that housed Paks Grocery, owned by the father of one of my school friends. By this point it was no longer a grocer. By 2015 it was gone altogether, replaced by a new residential complex. I have distinct memories of going there to buy candy and gum, goofing off with friends, and it is odd to think I can never step into the store again.
The same is repeated around the town, with many businesses and places I recall fondly replaced with new buildings and businesses, or, more depressingly, reduced to nothing but a vacant lot.
It’s a reminder of the eternal march of change, and underscores how precious memories are. The Duncan I knew in 1986 is long gone. Where the McDonald’s that opened in 1978 was a major event, the area is now home to every chain store and restaurant you can imagine. The Duncan I grew up in is not preserved in amber, but in my memories and the memories of others. Every time I forget a little detail, another piece of the Duncan I know is gone forever. It kind of bums me out.
Also, the city has way more roundabouts now.
More on this in an upcoming post.