Nature – Page 51 – My Outdoor Living Room

I read this week that Her Royal Highness Liz has declared war on single use plastics on the royal estates, effectively banning their use. Good on her, I say. More should follow her lead (unless it’s attached to a corgi).

It has been a gripe if mine for a while seeing how much litter lies around, not only in towns and cities but also in our countryside too. Our beauty spots, areas of refuge and escape, blighted by litter and debris. I’ve spoken personally about carrying out litter picking trips in my neighbourhood recently but as yet haven’t managed to do it. It’s something I feel is very helpful for both the community and ourselves. How many of us hate seeing litter? I can say hand on heart that I have never deliberately dropped litter, yet I feel compelled to pick other people’s up.

I know of walking groups that take bags on hikes with them and pick up any litter they find, actively enjoying and improving areas they love.

I sometimes find my day job very frustrating. Amongst other things day-to-day, I find myself dissatisfied. I imagine it is to do with the nature of the industry I work in, and not being able to see results. The fruits of your labour if you like. One night I was walking to my allotment and I saw rubbish everywhere I looked, so I started picking it up. Within a few strides I had picked up an armful of fast food wrappers, plastic bottles, all sorts. I saw instant results. The pathway was clear. I felt satisfied. That was it I thought. The reward for putting in the effort. The benefits for myself, the community (who probably dropped the litter to begin with, he says, sceptically), as well as the environment outweighed the ‘inconvenience’. Mental health organisations call it ‘ecotherapy’. I’ll cover this further in another post.

For many, we think we shouldn’t have to pick it up. I didn’t drop it, I’m not picking it up. Like we’re idiots for working for free. What if everybody thought that? Granted, it’s not our job, but the fact is, local authorities do not care. That’s the sad part. It’s too expensive to do it, so leave it. A study in the UK showed that areas where littering and dog fouling were tolerated had higher levels of crime. The general feeling is the majority will drop litter if they see litter. If a neighbourhood looks neglected, it attracts further neglect.

I bet if there was a reward scheme for litter picking (financial), we would see a shift in visible litter. In the mean time, volunteers do it for the most part. The people who really make a difference to where they live and other areas too, and I’m going to join them. Look at your own area if you can and get out and make some changes, see how you and your area change along the way. It could be really good!

If you’re in the UK, use the link below to find litter pickers in your area.

https://www.litteraction.org.uk/

Stay tidy!

I went back to the rough ground today for the first time since autumn. Very much like last time it was very sunny and bright, with a piercing blue sky, and shades of yellows and browns. The one noticeable absence however was the greenery. Back in the autumn there was still a fair amount of leaf cover and the whole area still felt quite private, but today, there were none to shield the outside world away. It felt very open and exposed.

As well as the world’s eyes creeping in, so too were the sounds of the urban surroundings – a cacophony of emergency service sirens, the hum of the motorway passing overhead nearby, the clang of lorries as their wheels find the weathered potholes on the carriage way. The increased noise, combined with being able to see more cars and people whizzing by, makes me feel, I notice, vulnerable. The rough ground isn’t the hidden sanctuary it once was. A guy wobbles by on a push bike that is far too small for him, weaving through the abandoned shopping trolleys, burned out car, and dumped boiler. People walk by going about their business. It just feels…less private.

But this area is not mine. I don’t own it. Is that what we want from the world? A place just for ourselves and a select group of people that we hand pick? No riff raff. No undesirables. No strangers. By doing that, we cease to grow as people and our horizons begin to shrink. We become set in our ways and spoilt by routine. If this rough space were mine, and only mine, who would join me to fight for it if the need rose up? Nobody would see it like I do because they would never be given the chance. Like a walled secret garden.

In amongst all this, I could actually hear a hive of bird song. Very spring-like. A volery of long tailed tits fluttered overhead from leafless branch to leafless branch, taking me completely by surprise. I would have expected them to be blue tits, or something equally as common. Back in the summer, I noted how quiet it was here for birds. Now it’s coming to life.

I start to make my way back to the pretty much pointless exercise that some would call my career. I note the old pavements I am walking along, revealing, beneath all the growth, the rough ground’s urban heritage. The samsara of ruralisation, urbanisation and then ruralisation. How quickly nature reclaims what man sees as a waste. The decaying fallen branches lying around, releasing their carbon back into the atmosphere shows that everything is a cycle. Birth, death, prosperity, decay. The tide giving and taking. What goes up, comes down. And every dog, always has its day.