Saturday, 3 August 2019

The Stuff of Nightmares


          I woke up this morning (cue classic blues riff) in a bad mood because of a nightmare. I had dreamt I was changing a lightbulb, but what should have been a simple task turned into an excruciatingly complex and frustrating one, a saga of flickering lights, tangled wires, mislaid tools and total bewilderment. This may not qualify as nightmarish for most but, for someone who prides himself on having a degree of competence in matters practical, it felt like a painful puncturing of self-confidence that left me feeling superfluous, anxious and angry all through breakfast. Now, nobody is really interested in other peoples’ dreams (except professional psychoanalysts, gypsy fortune-tellers and, perhaps, acquaintances who feature in them), but I’ll tell you anyway. My dream had been a re-working of an actual event earlier in the week, when I had spent hours trying to fix a fault in the heat-exchanging ventilation system in our apartment. I admit that, in doing so, I was pushing the limits of my competence, but curiosity sometimes gets the better of me.
          A dream is unique to the dreamer. No one else is involved in the experience. It is ephemeral and vanishes in the full awakening of consciousness. But, when the residual effect is to set your mood for the day, your dream does impinge on others. So, I duly apologised for my grumpiness and resolved to put it behind me. After all, a sour mood induced by nothing more than a dream must surely not be allowed to set the tone for the day: there is much to be done and much to enjoy. Carpe diem and all that.
          Just one of the things that must be done – and which is currently occupying some of my time – is to convince the Establishment to act to prevent the climate emergency developing further. The declarations, intentions and targets so far extracted from governing bodies represent recognition that the problem exists, but do not carry much conviction. Actions, as ever, will speak louder than words. Inevitably, there are obstacles in the way of effective legislation, the obvious one being the reluctance of vested economic interests to let go of their profits. Less obvious is the distance effect, i.e. the further away is the threat, the less is the urgency. We all know how that works, but here is a climate-change related example. Last week it was so hot that train services were disrupted by buckling rails: this week it is so wet that services are disrupted by flooding. I didn’t mind so much about last week because I wasn’t travelling by train, but this week I was and therefore had to admit that the inconvenience caused by severe weather was not just someone else’s problem.
          My journey was neither critical nor urgent in the context of the world’s troubles, though there may have been other passengers who felt differently. I was going to Heaton Moor for a session of the Heatons Jazz Appreciation Society – my reward for having worked during the day at tasks, such as fixing things and saving the planet, that can be quite tiresome. A balance of work and play is a reasonable aspiration for those of us who are lucky enough to have a place in a prosperous society, yet even this simple aspiration could be beyond the reach of future generations if we do not prevent the eco-disaster that is unfolding.
          I wake up most mornings torn between a desire to improve the world and a desire to enjoy the world. This makes it hard enough to plan the day, but it’s even harder when the trains don’t run on time. A bit of a nightmare for some.

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