3/12/12

Cardiff Bay, South Wales.  The most potential for environmentally friendly energy sources so far...yet not cost effective.  It has been a continuous culture shock when the majority of reasoning behind the lack of environmentally friendly items has been because of cost, go America?

Today global climate change and its results were directly compared to 9/11.  Why is it we are able to pay more attetnion to immediate, inumerous, and tragic losses more so than the same loss over a period of a year.  Last year over 50,000 people died of heat stroke(global warming) yet we cannot wrap our heads around this increasingly tragic string of events.  How sickening it is to describe our generation as instant gratification, but the truth seems to come out.  Why can't we see what's happening?  A dramatic sea level rise is expected to occur within the next 2-4 decades and those towns(NYC to Buxton) will be below sea level...imagine.  It's real and its happening.  Today matters.

Walked the length of the bay(about 1.2 miles) and ended at the opera house.  The walk itself was bleak.  Dampness seeped through the skin, but the watery air was perfect.  I've missed this connection to the sea.  A rare breath of salt came through like a shooting star, and I saw each one.

Skaters, odd couples, dog walkers.  Nothing like a stroll to watch real life pass by.  Time itself seems nonexistent.  the days continue to grow, as do I.

Here I am with little piggy.  Dont' worry, swine flu is completley irrelevant.  St. Fagan's Museum was awesome.  They have relocated and recreated a number of historical Welsh homesteads into one area, creating the most representative picture of Welsh culture(for me)thus far.  Pigs were common sources of food in historic Wales.  The Welsh are even thought to have coined the 'piggy bank'.  This is because you can feed them trash and all your leftovers(i.e. your spare change) and when you slaughter them you reap the benefits(breaking the bank, you're rich).  How clever.

Welsh have great gardens.  Note taking on this is a must.  I will localize and provide 85% of my vegetables this summer.  Goal is written down...must do it.(Picture also at St. Fagan's)

Then to Tintern Abbey, a monastery dissolved by Henry VIII.  A poet's dream.  William Wordsworth wrote lines describing the green of this valley.  Luckily caught it at sunset.  This place was not only a monastery, but a symbol of power.  It used the river beside it as clean drinking water, hydro power, and you guessed it....toilets.  River runs right to left-i.e. your dorm did NOT want to be on the left side of Tintern.

I digress.  This place is magnificent.  A church, school, home, farm, vineyard, garden...all settled in a quaint valley with a mountain creek and a river running alongside.  Already checked, price of land is what you'd expect.  I imagine I'll retire someplace like this.



I

W.4

The ruins are silent, yet speak with magnitude.
a Dream once had
                     and becoming my own

cricket.

a moment i know i own
but how? can something so immense be tamed

archways peaks and valleys
there is something to be said
                    and no
      words
come

this Game i play so easy and quick
a selfish existence i allow, i feed It

say it. 

need i steal from another? does my heart fall quiet today
if any
should i never find words his might suffice

'glamourous night
careless rapture crest of the wave
           the dancing years

king's rhapsody

perchance to dream'

say it, easy now.