An object designed for every day use.
Children use stamps as play toys, a way to literally make a mark on the world around them, to establish an identity and say "I am here." As adults, our sense of mortality becomes the dominant framework for our existence, and we become desperate to leave a mark, to commemorate our importance and say, "I was here." As children or adults, the underlying need is the same--to matter.
In truth, we are here but an instant, and then cast backward as shadow. As we disappear, the future takes that which we call ours and either blinks it from existence, or passes it to another's hands. Like us, possession is transient, and possessions themselves are impermanent.
By applying this stamp to everything you call yours, you acknowledge these truths even as you lengthen your shadow. The application of this stamp is thus a celebration--of a mattering that does not endure, but that defies chimera.
