18:56
Unknown
I've written before about how, when visiting previous
neighbourhoods in which I once lived, I'd often feel that, if
I was lost in thought, I could walk up the path of one of my
former homes, insert my key in the lock, and enter to find
everything just as it was in my day. It would feel like
the most natural thing in the world if it were so.
There's one old home where that illusion is becoming
difficult to sustain 'though, due to the many significant
changes, deletions and additions to the surrounding envi-
rons. Fields vanished, schools and churches demolished
(and rebuilt in a different style), more houses crammed
into seemingly ever-narrowing streets, etc.
to recapture the ambience of the place as is was when I
resided there, but it would be a gossamer, temporary effect,
which would dissolve whenever I looked out of a window at
a changing terrain, in many ways dramatically different to
how it was back in my day in the '60s and early '70s.
The same thing is happening where I currently live.
There was once a quiet stretch of road between the top
and bottom of the hill on which my house is situated, but
new houses and flats are being erected, the result of which
will be to congest a formerly open and spacious area, and
destroy any remnant of a once impressive view from the
top of the road. It's called 'progress', so I'm told.
So why does 'progress' so often ruin that which
seems already ideal? Horizons are narrowing, dreams
are diminishing, and hope is faltering. The world is clos-
ing in around us, robbing us of space and sky, and vistas
of distant kingdoms that once held us in their thrall. The
world is getting smaller, my friends, and soon there
won't be enough personal space for anyone.
"Oh give me land, lot's of land, under starry
skies above - don't fence me in" run the lyrics of an
old song. Too late, alas! It won't be too long 'til the last
fence post is planted, and the final nail hammered in.
Prepare to kiss your far horizons goodbye.
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