The end of the Dream

The end of red, like so many other things, passing without being noticed.

~~

We will look back and wonder to ourselves: was this just a dream? Not just our own lives-which is mysterious enough-but the ideas and ideals that we once cherished. The disappearance of religion, for instance, replaced by what..a vague memory of beauty (or perhaps savagery and institutional repression)? Communism, too, for all its horrors held out the faint promise of an alternative way of thinking about our relation to the world and to other people. And the Labour movement which was largely responsible for ushering in the social welfare state and making practical notions of decency, fairness. That too, you suspect, all belongs to an era that is rapidly drawing to a close.

New things come along and sometimes others are re-born, but it's never quite the same. 

The silence and splendour of nature is probably also something we will only be able to tell our kids about. Ways of thinking become obsolete, words drop out of usage. Get real!

In some cases we will wonder, in the early morning light, whether the dream was really all it was made out to be, if it wasn't an illusion, speaking to only part of our nature. The desire for unceasing progress, for example, shattered by war/greed/hubris. That's not the point; we now think, like the poor man's son in Adam Smith's parable, that achieving our goals leaves us or would leave us dissatisfied. Over time we look back, grow up a bit, fall out of love and ask ourselves: how on earth did we get so hooked to ..

The moment came, time pressed its lip to your ear, nothing was the same again.

Great summer sun, great summer sun,
All loss burns in trophies.

--G. Barker.

~~

Is UKIP now the third largest party? What does that say about the way things are going? And Europe, too, with its lurch to the right.