Nuclear Test Edition  ·  Rubber Band Ball

Rainy Days and Dry Gardens

Out here, early May is perhaps the most beautiful time of year. New leaves deck the town with vivid green, and golden evenings set the pale Bath stone aglow. Over the weekend I visited a friend in Bath, and headed home early on Monday morning.

I left the house a little after dawn. A light rain was falling, and the hills were swathed in folds of cloud. The world was damp, glistening, grey and green. There was no roar of traffic, just the caws of Corvidae and a single, trilling blackbird. My brother finds the countryside too quiet for his taste—the silence unsettles him—but I could be happier without the constant noise of crowds and cars and planes and squawking phones.

Streetlights winked out one by one as I trudged downhill through steadily worsening weather. By the time I reached the station, it was tipping down, and my coat—a burden the previous day—had become a welcome blessing.

Rain is business as usual here in the West, but there’s a drought back home. Apparently in south-east England there’s less water available per person in a year than in the Sudan, or Egypt; a turn-up for the books in our damp little isle. And yet, despite this, we still use more water than… well, pretty much anyone. No wonder there’s a hosepipe ban.

Wealth and technology have isolated us. We all turn on the tap dozens of time a day, and out comes clean water, free of harmful bacteria and poisonous chemicals. It’s so easy; we do it without thinking about it. We waste a vital resource, forgetting that it is life itself. And the longer we forget, the more cause we will have to regret it.

1 response

Brilliantly written. It makes sense as well. For half of the world plays with their blogs and iPods and fancy technology, the real problems of the world STILL need water, food and medicine.

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