Tag: climate crisis

The day after tomorrow…

Julian Simpson in his most recent newsletter:

“And we have to remember that there is an “other side” to this, an overmorrow where we step back out into the world and the shops are open, and the cafes and bars and museums and galleries, and we can see our friends and family and put our lives back together. It’s going to be different, I think, but there’s a chance there may be benefits in the long term, if we can learn from this quiet time and find the upside to a planet given a moment to take a breath and regenerate. We have had a glimpse of what happens to nature when human beings just stop for a bit, and that at least seems to be a valuable thing to observe and learn from.”

I dearly hope that he is right.

Considering the state of the planet; levels of social inequality; and the spread of populist and isolationist ideologies, we need a seismic shift in values and policy.

It won’t come from our leaders on their own; it has to come from each and every one of us.

We must open our eyes and see!

As I walked to work1 along the sea front this morning, with the sun shining down, I could not help but think of this passage from Nick Cave on the beauty that we too often miss…

“If there is sadness in Ghosteen, perhaps it is the recognition that we are often blind to the splendour of the world and indifferent to its attendant wonder. Perhaps the sadness is the recognition that the world is indeed beautiful, that it spins within the palm of our own hands and its beauty is available to all, if only we had eyes to see.”

~ Cave, Nick, The Red Hand Files2 (2019)

If anything good comes out of the Covid-19 pandemic, I hope it is this. I hope that we emerge with a renewed appreciation for each other and the world around us. Society has been consumed for too long by capitalist and commercial ideologies – resulting in a moral decline – that has contributed to the creation of an inequitable, fractured society and a broken planet.

We must not allow ourselves to be blind to the beauty of the world any longer. We must open our eyes and see!

  1. I’m Vice Principal of a Secondary School, and we were opening for vulnerable pupils and children of key workers.[↩]
  2. ‘The Red Hand Files‘ started in September 2018. Nick Cave responds to questions from fans. The results are deeply intimate and thought provoking.[↩]