One swan was noticeably slower than the other and thus, thanks to some half-memory from a Warner Brothers cartoon I saw years ago, I secretly named him "Wilbur" and sometimes provided him with dialogue of the slow-witted mountain person variety. He and his nameless, brighter accomplice would show up at 1pm each day like clockwork and once or twice a week I would take great pleasure and relaxation in feeding them bits of bread that I'd try to save for them. It's not hard to see why seniors enjoy doing this sort of thing. By getting lost in their little world I could take a nice break from the stresses of my own.
It was surprisingly difficult to get a decent shot of the two opportunistic ducks that would always see me feeding the swans and then nip over to try and steal what they could. The smarter, nameless swan often got really pissed at the ducks and once it even managed to clamp it's beak over the neck of a duck and give it a good shake - followed by a honk which I can only assume was Swan for "Fuck off you little bastard". Swan's are pretty foul mouthed eh? Anyways, I managed to get one of them in the bottom right of this picture.
Now, this is right along the waterfront - specifically the waterfront which is supposed to be the shining glory of Toronto with all those million dollar condos that get the Che Guevera T-shirt brigade rubbing their tits in a fury. A lot of effort has been put into the landscaping, architecture and general cleanliness of this place - a rough analogue to my beloved Thames Embankment. Thanks to where I was temping, I've even gotten some interesting glimpses at what is planned for the future of the waterfront along with plenty of Utopian concept drawings and models. All that said and I still caught plenty of this.
Which brought my mind back to things I've been reading in general and specifically about microscopic plastics in the world's supply of water. The mind starts to reel a bit, or at least mine did. I began to wonder how much of the chemical composition of Lake Ontario has been replaced by plastic particles. Then I wondered how much plastic was inside the Swan's stomachs. How much they were taking in with each bite of the bread I was tossing into the water for them to eat. How much of my own body, no matter how tiny a percentage, was contaminated by these particles - given the old 60% water routine. Idly tossing the bits of whole wheat into Wilbur's path, I felt like what I was doing was all of a sudden a bit sinister on just about every level possible. In a word, it felt polluted.
I appreciate that VICE magazine is an amusing and often offensive (though not for the reasons you'd think) source of information - but their Internet television network VBS is a largely different creature in terms of raw quality, particularly their journalistic programs. I've referred to their Toxic Alberta series before and now, in relation to what I'm talking about, I'll refer you to the preview of their upcoming Toxic Garbage Island series that will cover, firsthand, what is going on in the South Pacific Sub-Tropical Gyre. The author of the corresponding article for the magazine had a frank lead-in to the topic which I think, after having read more on this, stands as highly appropriate.----
I'm not one of those guys who corners folks at parties to rant at them about biodiesal or calls people "fucking idiots" for being skeptical about global warming. But I should also point out that I'm not one of those Andrew Dice Claw "Fuck the whales" types either.
The problem with all the bravado on both sides of the ecology debate is that nobody really knows what they are talking about. Trying to form opinions on climate change, overpopulation, and peak oil hinges on ginormous leaps of faith based around tiny statistical deviances that even the scientists studying them have a hard time understanding. It gets so convoluted with all the yelling and politics that sometimes you just want something huge and incontrovertibly awful to come along for everybody to agree on. Something you can show anyone a picture of and go, "See? We're fucked?"
Well, I have just such a thing. There is a Texas-size section of the Pacific Ocean that is irretrievably clogged with garbage and it will never go away. And I have seen it with my own eyes. Case Closed. Oh, you want to hear more? Ok, fine.
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That last hyperlink is, of course, to the full article online. I don't fully agree that the problem rests on understanding tiny variances, the variances are anything but tiny, however the urge to have something which can shock people out of complacency is something for which I have a great deal of sympathy.
Meanwhile the BBC has an ongoing diary that started a few days ago, which looks at the problem from the perspective of the bird population in Midway Island.
I present this information not to lord anything over anyone or to encourage a proper case of Doom to fall about you like a funeral shroud. I'm doing it partly to buck up the old sanity, partly because it's important that as many people be as aware as possible so that when they think about - say - reusing or not reusing those thing plastic bags we use at the supermarket for our fruit and vegetables, they maybe think of this shit and opt toward the more responsible option.
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ALSO: LET'S DO THIS AMERICA
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2 comments:
Loved your "Swan Song".
Ah yes. The London Embankment.Happy memories indeed.
Sadly, those swans' gullets are going to fill with plastic regardless... at least you're throwing something nutritious and tasty into the mix. More bread = less plastic, in my mind.
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