TOUCAN DAN.

These rare color photos of Paris were taken over 100 years ago. 

In 1909, a wealthy French banker named Albert Kahn wanted to document the world using a new color photo process called Autochrome Lumière, so he commissioned 4 photographers to take their cameras all over the world.

One of the cities they documented was Paris.

Starting in 1914, Kahn’s photographers, Leon Gimpel, Stephane Passet, Georges Chevalier and Auguste Leon, documented life in Paris using color filters made from dyed potato starch grains.

They made these color photos over a century ago (with a small amount of color enhancing done on the original shots).

In addition to the many shots of Paris, around 72,000 Autochromes from around the globe were created through Kahn’s project.

As a millennial who has no debt, a 401(k) and an IRA, and who is having a house built, I just want to say something to counter all the negative messages bombarding my generation about how lazy and entitled we all are.  Do you know what’s the difference between me and those statistics?

Sheer dumb luck.

That’s it.  I didn’t do anything differently than anyone else.  I didn’t make better choices or go into the right major or any of that nonsense.  I was just lucky enough to be born into a family with parents who could put enough into my savings that, when combined with scholarships, allowed me to graduate from college without any debts.  I had pretty much no savings by the time I got my degree, but starting from nothing is still easier than starting with a negative balance.

I got hired within two months of graduation, and I’ve been with that company for going on six years.  Again, nothing but dumb luck.  My major, creative writing (one of the stereotypical ‘useless degrees’) has nothing to do with my career.  They just needed employees and I happened to interview at the right time.  And I was lucky enough that the job was in an area where I could live at home, rent-free, developing the savings that put me in a position to sign a contract on a house.

I was privileged and lucky.  That’s it.

Sure, I worked hard in school.  I gave it my all in my job interview.  I’ve put in effort to get where I am.

But people without the head starts I had have worked much harder.  I didn’t have to claw my way out of debt and poverty to get where I am.  If I had to do that, I wouldn’t be here.  I’d be another statistic for the boomers to dismiss.

You’re not doing anything wrong.  You aren’t the ones who broke the economy.  I haven’t figured out some correct, adult way of doing things that you haven’t.  I just happened to start the game with some of the cheat codes.

Let’s look at today’s To-Do List:

Vacuum - Nope

Clean kitchen - Nuh-uh

Cook dinner - Just can’t get there

Pay bills - Can’t quite reach ‘em

Aries: If you’ve got something to say / Name a time and place / Face to face

Taurus: I am slow to anger / But I toe the line

Gemini: Now you call me “amoral,” / A “dangerous disgrace,”

Cancer: I look back on where I failed / And in every place I checked / The only common thread has been your disrespect

Leo: Hey, I have not been shy / I am just a guy in the public eye / Tryin’ to do my best for our republic / I don’t wanna fight / But I won’t apologize for doing what’s right

Virgo: Careful how you proceed, good man / Intemperate indeed, good man / Answer for the accusations I lay at your feet or / Prepare to bleed, good man

Libra: I am not the reason no one trusts you / No one knows what you believe

Scorpio: Here’s an itemized list of thirty years of disagreements

Sagittarius: I will not equivocate on my opinion / I have always worn it on my sleeve

Capricorn: Even if I said what you think I said / You would need to cite a more specific grievance

Aquarius: I can’t apologize because it’s true