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Real stairs leading nowhere

I recently read an article about Walsenburg, a city in southern Colorado. The article said near Walsenburg there are stairs literally leading nowhere. It seems that many decades ago those stairs were the main access to a local mine. When the mine closed, all the equipment was relocated, except for the stairs that are still there even today.

Last year, when I visited Boston, I saw a building in downtown Boston with large outdoor stairs leading nowhere. It seems the builders decided it was a nice architectural touch to include those stairs, even if the stairs do not provide any practical function.

And in San Jose, California, you will find the house build in the late 19th century and early 20th century by Sarah Winchester, widow of William Wirt Winchester, a member of the family whose company built the rifle that still today bears their name. Winchester’s house in San Jose has many stairs leading to nowhere.

It is said that the reason for the strange design was the desire of Sarah Winchester of tricking the spirits of those killed by the Winchester rifle, spirits she thought were haunting her.

We have then three examples of stairs leading nowhere. In one case (Walsenburg) there are historical reasons to explain it. In another case (Boston), there are aesthetic reasons. In the same case (San Jose), there is a mix of psychological and even metaphysical reasons.

In the three cases, however, and regardless of the reasons, we see stairs that previously had the function of allowing people to access a certain place they needed or wanted to access, now do not provide any practical function.

On the basis of those three examples of stairs leading nowhere, I asked myself what elements in our lives and in our society are like those stairs, that is, elements that no longer fulfill any function due to unexpected historical changes, new aesthetic preferences, or psychological or spiritual developments.

Perhaps we insist on using the stairs that once led us to a productive place, such as the stairs near Walsenburg once did. But now technology and globalization removed the old elements of production and the old stairs are useless in our search for a stable source of income.

Perhaps we are using stairs like the ones in Boston, that is, stairs that, regardless of how many times or how hard we try, will always keep us outside the building, preventing us from getting what we want or need. Perhaps those who know the stairs lead nowhere look at us and feel a mix of sympathy and disgust.

Perhaps, due to psychological and spiritual reasons, the stairs of our lives and our relationships are now useless and confusing, as the ones in Sarah Winchester’s house or complicated and deceitful, as the stairs in “Relativity,” the famous lithography by Escher.

From another perspective, I believe politics, religion, education, mass media and other institutions and activities that once provided a positive function have become now stairs leading us to nowhere.

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