The Grey

We’re in an age where the ‘facts’ our parents were so insistent we popped off to university to gather (from learned folk), are the very topics of discussion that see Uncle Brian storm away from Christmas dinner into the welcoming arms of a Benson & Hedges, or cause the Construction Manager at work to dive into a 'not-so-subtle-right-wing-rant' about ‘snowflakes’, ‘socialism’, and some on brand form of faux political righteousness.

In earnest, it's difficult not to lose faith in sanity. In reality. In the strength of facts.

After, two degrees, 10 years of work in the environmental sector, and countless awkward Christmas dinners and work breaks later, I found myself broken.

I’ve heard it called ‘environmental fatigue’. I refer to it as ‘The Grey’.

I get hit by The Grey when I first open my eyes in the morning. A thin, oil-like slick covers everything within my visual field, and the urge to recoil back into the fetal position under my duvet is almost too much to fight.

I get hit by The Grey when I take my first sip of sustainably sourced coffee as I begin to question whether my life’s efforts to make a difference are also, like so many companies I watch, tantamount to ‘greenwashing’. Then I pour at least half, always, down the drain.

I get hit by The Grey when I pop open my ‘passed its sell-by date’ Medion laptop to review yet another environmental ‘initiative’, ‘strategy’, ‘management plan’ or such nonsense by yet another corporation who wish to win tenders by telling me what I want to hear, not what they actually intend on doing, or even care about.

I get hit by The Grey when I realise my hopes and dreams of making a difference to the world have been vastly reduced to abstract aspirations that I flirt with not unlike a Daubenton’s bat with a midge. Actually exactly like a Daubenton’s bat with a midge. Get close, certain annihilation.

I get hit by The Grey, always. Just, always.

The country is selling house to neighbours with Stavia smiles feasting on Neonicotinoid sugar beet, hosting hedgerows with snares, enjoying dalliances with well spoken men on horses with blood on their hounds, retiring to meadow car parks, and singing of train tracks through ents.

The only medicine is a walk.

_____________________________

I hover down towards the lowland meadow behind the cottage. I keep to the hedgerows as to not disturb the grazing deer.

‘Hawthorn, blackthorn, dead elm, oak, willow, hawthorn, blackthorn, oak.’

I follow the well flailed boundary. Any sign of species presence fills me with dread rather than happiness as my mind hit by The Grey turns to thoughts of inevitable extinction instead of joy as a confirmation of life.

Almost by tradition now, I huddle under the old Sally tree at the most western corner of the fields. The achromatic landscape is a young plantation woodland abutting lowland meadow with fields of dancing elephant grass keeping court with the standard oaks between the two.

It's sunset. Gathering my coat close around my chin, The Grey attacking each pastel powered shape with a cruel acetone which began to rain down upon me. Well protected in the arms of the willow I challenged myself to consider how I could throw off this optical malaise, this ocular suffocation.

Dusk fell with a thud. A murder passed overhead. Nearby a lone buzzard made an escape towards the plantation in fear of the corvid army.

Another sound filled the still air directly after. A ghost sat on the kissing gate across the field. Being neither Roman, nor Greek, I decided to ignore whirling thoughts of impending death and scoffed at the idea of any imminent successes that could be realised owing this Athenian mirage.

I instead, strangely, felt an intense sense of relief. Every single thing I have seen, for as long as I can remember, has seemed languid, defeated. However this barn owl’s image was not. The aspect was sharp, strong lines and vivid tones, albeit grayscale in honesty, the most colourful thing I could imagine. But I didn't have to imagine. I was seeing it. This was a fact.

I sat motionless under the standard, feeling a warmth coursing through my veins and a veil drop from my eyes.

The spirit called out and was gone.

I remained a while to see if I could once again be gifted with the sight and colour of this snowy white apparition. But it did not return, and I humbly tred back across the fields.

____________________

The next morning I awoke to the familiar swirl of my artex ceiling. I blinked, conditioned to resist any immediate efforts to drag my bones from their organic cotton earth.

A soft light had bargained its way past the thick curtains and unexpectedly I appreciated its pastel hues, vibrating over the staccato ceiling.

I was...not...The Grey was gone.

Not trusting a hope I turned to the stack of unfinished books of the bed side table. A verifiable symphony of visual scores, fantastic tints, tinges, and shades.

I felt elated, until I drew a connection between my new found lost sight and the magnificent owl I saw the previous evening. The Grey began to descend as I feared for where it was nesting, recalling all the nearby developments and remembering from years of ecology consultancy experience the reality that proper consideration for species such as owls often descended into a 'tick box' exercise for development companies who remained unchallenged.

As I was slowly being dragged back behind the torturous screen, I looked out the bedroom window at the curtilage of the property where if flowed along the country road.

There, as if it had previously been a dream, was Athena herself.

In that moment something changed. My mind decided its energy could be better spent elsewhere. This type of positivity had been lost in the countless days, weeks, and months spent trying to show the world, through facts, through learning, through data, all the needless damage we are doing to their environment. This hope had been crushed when I saw more and more world leaders turning back time, and more people claiming facts to be conspiracies. I remembered that reality is based in facts and I had spend a lifetime in pursuit of them.

A feeling of purpose swelled in me. A hope that not all was lost and that any action I take was better than apathy. I felt the ‘fatigue’ begin to cast off like the unwanted coat it was.

I opened a notebook and scribbled a few lines, words ‘air dropped’ from somewhere, perhaps from the Greek goddess herself:

‘Terse explanations for a disappearing plantation

Young minds see the trouble ahead,

Too late to influence deregulation ? But not:

Our rage and indignation .

All, a futile exercise, a follied flight .

Lately their survival, their plight bring cause to

Broad wings so grounded

Absent, is quartering in this final night’

I’d picked my battle. I’d continue to do my part and hope others would find their role. I’d work with shadows and continue to risk he fury of uncles and construction managers everywhere with facts and a renewed sense of purpose.

___________________________

The impacts of COVID-19, Brexit and the continued de-regulation of environmental protections will have impacts on many species, including the ‘Barn Owl’ Tyto alba. Many of us that work in environmental disciplines find it difficult to ‘keep the faith’, our life and our work a continuous existential crisis heavily reliant on the cooperation of the many while we face destruction at the hands of a few. Sometimes, it's about picking a battle and sticking to it. One person can’t save the world, but everyone doing a little just might.