Years End

I have been trying to write a closure to this "unprecedented year ", this 2020, for weeks now but have struggled because the cause of the year of disquiet and disruption remains with us. Six new locally acquired cases of COVID- 19 in Victoria today after sixty one days without community transmission in this State. It was an absence, hard won by severe restrictions of citizen movement and I did not realise how heart sore I would feel at the thought of perhaps having to repeat that process in response to another outbreak.

And I am one of the lucky citizens who being retired, and computer able, has been able to choose the boundaries of my interactions with the world. I have stayed very safe. But gradually I have been relaxing my vigilance . I have been back in the pool regularly, enjoyed a hug here and there, eaten a meal in a restaurant and shopped in small spaces. And I have felt myself gently thawing despite not knowing I was frozen. On this last day of the old year I find myself wanting the ease of a covid free world back.

And yet....because I believe our earth is severely stressed because of the consumption of resources by ever more human beings, and that COVID -19 is a symptom of that stress, I don`t want to go back to the way we were. I want coming out of this year to mean different actions in relation to managing the resources of this planet, a different spirit to be guiding our decisions. I don`t know how to be a part of that other than to be aware of and manage my own consumption. I struggle with this daily as do the writers in FIRE, FLOOD , PLAGUE, a collection of responses to 2020 in Australia, edited by Sophie Cunningham. As I read it ( and it is worth the read ) I was struck by the irony of so many people in Australia talking about how poor our country`s response is to environmental issues and so many people in Australia voting in a government with an avowedly anti environment stance. It broke my heart then and it breaks my heart now.

This year has shown us to be a resilient, and generous people, willing to be guided for the greater good. In America, the ever climbing death toll from COVID -19 demonstrates what happens when the greater good is sacrificed to the ego of man or "tangerine chimpenfuhrer"as the current president has been so appropriately nick named. ( To my mind at least ...although another impact of this startling year has been that I have developed a tic which causes me to use language I would not otherwise countenance when hearing from or about this dreadful man ). Or the UK or Russia. Tyrants and Despots do not rule for the greater good. And the virtues of a view of man as herd animal on planet earth has its own moral and real life repercussions. Surely there is a middle road between leaders who control everything and leaders who choose to control nothing. Don`t get me started on cancel culture and white privilege and Black lives matter.

Ahhhh ...I find my self debating such issues of the universe with a kind of frustrated angst and using bad language to boot which is always a sign that reason and logic have departed. Wanting desperately for my own selfish purposes , a resolution to this pandemic crisis and easy answers to the rest. Of course .....!

I also recognise that this year has brought me creativity and calm and reacquainted me with . my inner child which is ...childish and funny and slapstick. These are huge gifts which have come in the space created by COVID -19. I have been unable to move away from my everyday or use travel or socialising or shopping to defend against the emotional forces which I may have denied if these avenues were open to me. And so I have done some healthful work on myself whilst also building a garden which has been a long awaited joy. I have a small oasis outside my studio over which a pig flies.

Just because he can. He is my symbol for this new year.

I wish a breeze under the wings of all the pigs in the universe for 2021. May the most unlikely get airborne !