Tulsa has a brand new, 100 acre, 450 million dollar public park called the Gathering Place. It’s beautiful and whimsical and thoughtful and pristine, and in any other major city WOULD GET COMPLETELY DESTROYED BY OUR GROSS HUMAN NATURES. But since Oklahoma as a whole state holds only 3.9 million people (LITERALLY THE AMOUNT OF PEOPLE LIVING IN LOS ANGELES)  it stays like this:

MAYBE it’s because I’ve been re-reading The Martian Chronicles, but when I visited,  I had the distinct feeling of being on either on a new version of Earth after Earth has been Destroyed, Or on a Mars that is Pretending to be Earth. ALSO IT’S CALLED THE GATHERING PLACE, which is the most sci-fi name for a park I have ever heard. People float around on boats with ice cream cones, kids laugh like a pre-recorded sound cue, grown-ups stroll, everybody seems blissful and maybe a little high, like they were given the Drug that makes them forget the Past.

Kids slide down a giant Swan, or Banana, Though nobody remembers what Bananas or Swans are. There is only Park.