Simplify

Right now here in Darwin we are experiencing the eye of category 1 Cyclone Carlos. Prior to the development of the tropical low and the accompanying 'very' wet (Over 400mm in 24 hours) weather I was busy getting on with simplifying my life and leaving the blogging world behind me. Just give it up, cold turkey like a bad habit or addiction... (I'm sure Thoreau wouldn't have spent his days blogging...! He'd probably have some great derogatory description for those who waste their time on such egocentric nonsense)

Instead of blogging mindless 'twitter' I have been reading 'Walden' by Henry David Thoreau and spending my days exploring, walking, paddling, planting etc... and loving it! But now I'm housebound, taking shelter from Carlos, the Wind and the Rain,and I'm too close to the computer to resist.

Here's some things I've seen over the past month or so.


(A great train headed south)


(A walk through the mangroves amongst the Mud-skippers)


(A mossy wonderland)


(Wild Ginger on a hillside in Litchfield National Park)


(Giant Myrtle Beach trees in a sacred gully in the Otways)


(Paddling a swollen river in Geelong)


(A living sculpture of plants and food in Collingwood)


(A magical era of bicycle innovation and invention)

Over the past month I have enjoyed some really wonderful experiences. I have shared most of these with the ones I love and we have felt blessed to live in a place that has so much natural beauty and to have the right to travel freely to almost any place we like in this country. 

I have also seen the continued trauma and pain suffered by Asylum Seekers and the lack of compassion shown by our Governments, media and many members of our society toward these vulnerable people. 

I have seen the continuation of racist policies and sanctioned discrimination against Indigenous people in the Northern Territory and I have seen the destruction and defilement of places that are incredibly dear to me.

It's a busy time in this life and everything seems to be moving way too fast. I resolved at the end of last year to make better use of my time and not bother too much with useless things. The more practical the better and there's no point to prattling on about it. I may find that while tapping away on this keyboard I have missed a perfect opportunity to learn to knit, sharpen a tool, identify a plant, skin a rabbit or grow a bean! Right now I could be writing a letter to a certain Shire Council challenging them on their decision to allow developers to channel their stinking festering drain pipes from their environmentally disastrous housing estate straight into the Plenty River that I love!
Maybe if I'd had just one spare day I could have spent it collecting all the shit that has washed through those drains and dumped it in the nearest showroom of that housing estate? Now that would have been time well spent!


(The destruction of the fields where I used to roam)

I took my boy out to the fields so he could experience the fresh air, the smell of the grass and to feel the dry bark and clay under his feet just as I did when I was his age! Alas I was too late! They have taken it all away!