Let Them Drink Water

It's an interesting time to be living day-to-day among the remnants of the world's greatest empire.

Yesterday we visited the Parco degli Acquedotti (the Park of the Aqueducts) where two of ancient Rome's eleven aqueducts still stand in significant stretches. They were an extraordinary feat of engineering, delivering water to the city in such abundance that it flowed continuously, never shutting off. Not just functional, but a statement of power, of wealth, of mastery over nature. Also beautiful.

Standing there, I kept thinking of the fountain outside the Bellagio in Vegas.

As the empire weakened, the aqueducts — once symbols of Roman greatness — became liabilities. Security risks. Points of vulnerability.

Hubris? Complacency? Failure of imagination?