Frutiger Aero, I Still Love You

Holly G
5 days ago
3 min read

Celebrating One Year of the T4R Blog

I started the T4R blog so I could write and share my thoughts about what I felt most passionate about. One year ago I uploaded my first blog post, Frutiger Aero: Nostalgia for a Future That Never Was . My hyperfixation on Frutiger Aero, what it meant for me and my generation, and the implications on the climate change debate in the 21st century, was so strong I felt I had to share.

One year later and the scope of the T4R blog has only grown! What began as just a place to dump my thoughts and expand the connection between my interests and current political and cultural debates has now expanded to long form essays and even collaborations with others.

I am so excited to see what new work comes out of this exploration, and the new projects I get to work on and publish.

As a return to what inspired me to share my writing in the first place, and because Frutiger Aero has recently resurfaced for me as an obsession, I decided to write a little poem to Frutiger Aero and what it means to me.

Find more Tools for Resistance here:

T4R Linktree

Frutiger Aero, I Still Love You

Frutiger Aero, I still love you.

Your saturated blue hues

Imbue my view with a renewed

Sense of hope.

Your vibrant greens,

Bubbles and trees,

Remind me of a future I can only see

When given time to pause and breathe.

Frutiger Aero, “the future we were promised.”

One where nature and technology

Combine and create

a cyber-optimistic biology

That grows and builds

a city scene, a collective dream

Where our hard work paid off.

Where our lessons were learned.

Where our demands were heard.

Where we saw the warning signs and acted in time

To ensure the wellbeing of all mankind.

Where – like an infographic in my 2nd grade classroom in 2009 – we came together hand in hand,

Gave the earth a hug and took a stand,

Generated and executed a rational plan,

Prioritising harmony and peace with the land,

Over ego, greed, and mindless extraction,

The sordid, sinister, selfish actions

Of a miniscule group, a tiny fraction

Of the earth’s population

Sacrificing the vast majority for small luxuries

It makes no sense to me

The way they senselessly,

Betray and consume endlessly,

Recklessly selling you and me shit we don’t need,

So we don’t accidentally start questioning

Why we can’t all be free.

I walk through grey streets,

Under grey sheets of clouds,

Stepping to the beat of your theme:

Aquatic ambiance, infinity frequencies, Online Office V4.20

I imagine I gaze over ocean waves as synth waves

Over harmonies of lens flares and piano scales.

And I could cry.

I could collapse where I’m standing,

I could throw a complete tantrum,

Scream “This is not fair! This was not supposed to happen!”

Because this is not what they promised us.

The beautiful cityscapes built in harmony with the environment

Do not match the phallic monstrosities erected with no rhyme or reason.

Frutiger Aero’s thriving wildlife is a far cry from our coastlines.

Our forests devoid of the necessities needed for biodiversity.

Our sun doesn’t shine that bright. Our water does not sparkle.

Our tech does not enhance, it is punitive and patriarchal.

All these hopeful images I grew up with that surrounded my early life,

Have devolved into empty promises, fake marketing and rotten lies

Tears stream down to my mouth and they taste like bubbles.

I think of myself as a child sobbing uncontrollably like this, inconsolably, because the polar bears were dying and everyone knew and no one seemed to care and there is a growing island of trash in the Pacific Ocean, and poison in our products, and clothes that would be wasted within the year, and the discarded food, and then the forests and the reefs, and the bugs, and why wasn’t anyone doing anything about it?

“It’s up to you to change the world.” I’m seven.

I can’t even change my socks without stumbling,

Or stand in front of a class without mumbling.

I would hide in the library, wake up one of the computers and the desktop displayed the rolling hills and clear skies of Windows XP 2000. Bliss.

And I could feel the breeze on my skin as though I were there.

And I wanted so badly for that picture perfect utopia to be real someday.

I could be there. We could all be there.

Frutiger Aero, I still think of you.

The future that never was.

My tears refract your resplendent colours,

And I feel with all my heart.

Frutiger Aero, I still love you.