Textures of Childhood

Deep memory is strongly sensory; smells in particular trigger memory flashbacks. Identity is memory; without your memories, you are no longer you.

Recently, I had a few memory flashbacks triggered by texture - the sense of touch. Not as strong or frequent as memories triggered by smell, but still very specific. In particular, furniture in my childhood home in Hanwell, West London. The green corduroy covering of the chairs in the living room; the mid-grey of the armchairs and sofa in the front room; the veneer on the side of the television set; the bobbly material of the curtains in my bedroom, red on pale yellow. The enamel paraffin stove that heated the bathroom on cold nights. Carpeting - and the Dunlop underlay, green and spongey. I associate with play, building cars and trains out of Lego, rolling them across the carpet, the tufts 

Texture of textiles too - the towelling beach robes my mother sewed for me and my baby brother when we holidayed on the Isle of Wight in 1964; my green-and-white striped school scarf, which I remember best from foggy days, breathing in through the damp woollen fibres, grey flannel school trousers, gaberdine school raincoat..

Bedding in the pre-duvet era, from itchy woollen blankets to the candlewick bedspreads - and the time-consuming art of making one's bed each morning - is another memory.

In the 'summer house' (as our garden shed was called, brick-built and glazed, under a sloping asbestos roof), there were gardening tools - these had one thing in common; wooden handles that would often splinter, causing pain to young hands. Bricks - I can recall clearly the texture of the front-garden wall; I would sit astride it, my horse, my railway engine.

A propos of sensory memory flashbacks - we have transported around 30 large and medium-sized boxes full of books from my late parents to Jeziorki; a big thanks to Marek, Jane, Felix, Eddie and Moni - many lengthy Zoom sessions looking at what goes where (to Derby, to Warsaw, to charity, to the skip). Bit by bit I am sifting through them; many books will head down to the działka (but first I need a floor-to-ceiling, wall-to-wall bookcase built for them all). 

In the meanwhile, my garage, where it's all sitting right now, has taken on the odour of 79 Cleveland Road! Walking into the garage now with my eyes closed, I sniff the air - and am transported a thousand miles to the west.

This time last year:
Stupendous sunset, Sułkowice

This time six years ago:
Politics - the importance of fact.

This time seven years ago:
Rural Mazovian toponyms

This time eight years ago:
Carrying the weight on both shoulders

This time nine years ago:
Railway history - the big picture

This time 11 years ago:
A new lick of paint form W-wa Powiśle

This time 12 years ago:
The ingredients of success

These are signs, tokens

As I wrote last week, a visible indicator of the ever-nearing completion of the S7 extension (Stretch A, 6.7km from the airport junction to Lesznowola), is the appearance of road signs. And quite odd they are too...

Imagine - you are sitting in your car, driving north up the S7 (European route E77); you pass Węzeł Zamienie (junction 66); the next one to the north is coming up soon - junction 65 for the S2 is but a kilometre away. But what's this? You do a double take at 90km/h. Siedlin? Where's Siedlin? MORE TO THE POINT -WHERE'S WARSAW? AND WARSAW AIRPORT MUST BE AROUND HERE SOMEWHERE! HAVE I TAKEN A WRONG TURN?

Siedlin, it turns out, is a "village in the administrative district of Gmina Płońsk, within Płońsk County, Masovian Voivodship. Population (2011): 369. It lies around 5km south-east of Płońsk and 59km (37 mi) north-west of Warsaw" (Wikipedia). On that basis, you can surmise that you are some 21km from Warsaw. But what a daft place-name to put on a road sign! It turns out (for those who really know their Polish trunk-road geography) that Siedlin sits on the junction of the S7, the DK50 (Warsaw's de facto and incomplete ring-road) and the DK10, the road to Szczecin. So now you know!

Signs for Raszyn from Węzeł Zamienie are downright misleading. In both cases, if driving from the south, you'd be much better placed to carry on to the next junction for Raszyn, then take the S2 eastbound one junction to Aleja Krakowska, then turn south. Avoiding the villages of Dawidy Bankowe, Dawidy, Jaworowa and Rybie.

Below: a few years ago, standing in this spot, the view would have been entirely unrecognisable. Above all, you'd be in the backyard of a farm, just fields ahead. My local landscape, utterly changed.

How it looked in the summer of 2018, click here.

Below: this sign is for drivers coming down the eastern service road from Dawidy. At least Warsaw is mentioned on this one. And don't even think of taking your horse and cart that way. Raszyn? Carry on for Warsaw, one junction north, then turn west, and come off after one junction. Faster, avoiding four villages.

Meanwhile, a misleading sign for anyone heading to Zgorzała from Warsaw. The southbound slip road shows the turning right to Zgorzała along with Zamienie and Raszyn... it is not! You'll end up on the western roundabout having to backtrack, assuming you realise you need to return from where you came.

This, below, is the real turn for Zgorzała - on the other side of the viaduct, the slip road leads to a spiral ramp, up and over the S7 on the viaduct, around the roundabout two photos up, and on to Zgorzała that way. A saving of half a kilometre of pointless driving.

Another misleading sign is at the top end of Zgorzała, for Mokotów, herding local traffic down ulica Karczunkowska towards ul. Puławska. This is madness. From here, to get to, say, Galeria Mokotów down Karczunkowska, then Puławska, then Rzymowskiego is 10.4km, passing 16 sets of traffic lights. If instead you go to Galeria Mokotów along the S7 and its continuation, the S79 turning onto ul. Marynarska, it's only 9.4 km. The first and last lights are on Rondo Unii Europejskiej and that's it. So why is the suggested route longer, more congested and far slower?

Below: it's straight on for Mokotów, actually, unless you like sitting in traffic jams.

This time last year:

Am I a serious man?

This time two years ago:
Sunset's trip

This time eight years ago
The importance of the rucksack for the body

This time 11 years ago:
How I almost saved Barrack Obama

This time 13 years ago:
Some anniversaries missed

This time 15 years ago:
Hissing of the summer lawns

Olden times in Wrocław and Gliwice

Travels by train around Poland are somewhat hit-or-miss these days with big delays being commonplace; is our railway infrastructure being hit by hackers from Russia? Opóźnienie może ulec zmianie. Za poniesione niedogodności przepraszamy. ("Delay may succumb to change. For indignities sustained, we apologise."). My return from Wrocław was punctuated by an hour-long transfer at Gliwice, chance for a wander around. 

The railway station (below) is complete, but access to it from front and back is complicated by a mass of reconstruction work from the front, and the building of a new bus station at the rear.

Below: plenty of pre-war architecture to remind one that this was once the German city of Gleiwitz. 

Below: unthinkable that ghost signs in German would have been visible even 20 years ago; with Germany and Poland both comfortable about their present borders, it's not a issue.

The same in Wrocław, 90 miles (145 km) north-west of Gliwice. Below: a pre-war shop sign adorns a branch of Poczta Polska on ulica Kościuszki; tastefully renovated facade, listed building. Google Maps Street View image from 2017 shows the building without the pre-war sign.

Below: I stayed at the Hotel Europejski, which I can highly praise for the price/quality balance. If you're thinking of staying here, choose a room facing the side street; the trams are noisy early in the morning.  

Below: Wrocław Główny station, always worthy of a snap. 

As I crossed ulica Oławska, I spotted this delightful two-door Opel Manta (the pre-facelift B1 version 1975-81); the butt of German jokes in the 1980s, but today a classic. 

Another two-door coupe of similar vintage, the Honda Prelude (1978-81), again in original pre-facelift form. Both these cars will hit their half-century some time this decade! Good to see a thriving classic car scene in Wrocław.

Below: some brutalist architecture from the 1960s, ul. Powstańców Śląskich

This time last year:
Are aliens good or bad?

This time two years ago:
Thoughts - trains set in motion

This time four years ago:
Great crested grebes and swans hatch

This time six years ago:
Jeziorki birds in the late May sunshine

This time seven years ago:
Making sense of Andrzej Duda's win

This time eight years ago:
Call it what it is: Okęcie

This time nine years ago:
Three stations in need of repair

This time ten years ago
Late evening, Śródmieście

This time 11 years ago:
Ranking a better life

This time 13 years ago:
Paysages de Varsovie

This time 13 years ago:
Spring walk, twilight time

Start late, finish late (more on the Speed of Life)

Genetically, we Homo sapiens are divided into larks and owls; some of us can wake up early and immediately throw themselves into action – get dressed in 30 seconds, gulp down a quick breakfast, go for a run or a walk and write the next chapter of their autobiography before starting the day’s work at 08:00 promptly. Not me. I try, but my attempts at larking end do not usually extend beyond 40 squats while waiting for the kettle to boil. I only really get into my stride after 09:30. And then haltingly.

There are now believed to be 351 individual genes that determine whether we are larks or owls. Those with the greatest number of 'lark' variants will flake out up to 25 minutes earlier than those without them. Indeed, the latter group is more productive after nightfall. The science suggests that if you're not a lark, there's little you can do to be productive in the morning.

I'm clearly an owl, though not an ultra-owl; my productivity is highest in the evenings; I’m holding the plank while listening to science podcasts, blogging or tweeting, my mind racing with thought. Right now, it's gone eight pm, and I'm switched on full. 

Bedtime is the limiting factor, however. Eight hours of quality sleep is sacred – though which eight hours, I’ve come to realise, is a question of season. Moving the clocks to and fro in autumn and spring is dangerous for the human organism, which, like all living beings, is governed by circadian rhythm. The sudden jolt in autumn when we lose an hour of afternoon daylight is critical – I have learnt to counteract the effects by the simple measure of ignoring it. At the last weekend of October, I go to bed an hour earlier and wake up an hour earlier, thus becoming a pseudo-lark for five months of the year. But the clock is a mere convention (czas jest umowny); my body knows that what is accepted as "22:00" between late October and late March is really 23:00, eleven hours after the solar zenith, not ten. What counts is the time between sunset and bedtime.

In practice, however, this is rather a two-hour shift; in high summer I tend to sleep from midnight to 08:00; as the evenings draw in, it’s 23:00 to 07:00. And then when the clocks go back, the target is 22:00 to 06:00. I say ‘target’, because as I wrote the other day, my evenings are a rush to complete the daily targets – work, exercise and creativity. So it’s possible to be in bed half an hour behind schedule –but not much more. 

Being an owl means I’m not chatty at breakfast meetings. These typically mean getting up an hour or two earlier than usual, skipping breakfast at home, making my way across town in crowded public transport on an empty stomach; arriving at my destination grumpy (głodny Polak to zły Polak – 'a hungry Pole is an irate Pole'). My first thought is food rather than small talk. And so I ignore others, piling the sandwiches on my plate, then slinking off to eat them, washed down with coffee, emitting a visible ‘do not disturb’ aura while doing so. After the event, however, full of fresh ideas, I’m far keener to share new insights and network with other participants. I’ll stay as long as it’s polite to do so, or unless – like today – a train awaits to whisk me off somewhere else.

This time six years ago:
Swans' way

This time seven years ago:
Sam Smith, Shepherd Neame and the Routemaster bus

This time nine years agor:
Rainy night in Jeziorki - no flood this time!

This time ten years ago:
Wide-angle under Pl. Wilsona

This time 11 years ago:
Ranking a better life

This time 12 years ago:
Questions about our biology and spirituality

This time 13 years ago:
Paysages de Varsovie

This time 14 years ago:
Spring walk, twilight time

Interstices - S2, S7, S79

These are places where soon, the casual walker won't be able to visit. Fencing is going up around the roadworks; before long, the entire junction will be open, with new connections from north to south, south to north, east to south, south to east, west to south and south to west. When the junction was built, it connected only the S2 to the S79 (running into Warsaw, passing the airport); the southern end was a stump terminating in fields that is now turning into the S7 extension. And so for several years, the junction only served traffic flowing east to west, west to east, east to north, north to east, west to north and north to west. So - time for a peek into the new sliproads that will soon be roaring with traffic.

Below: this view you'll get from your rear-view mirror as you drive onto the S2 (westbound) from the S7. This tunnel under the S79 was completed in 2013, when the S79 opened for traffic, connecting to the east-west S2. But this tunnel was built to connect the S7 extension to the S2 westbound. At the time, it was believed that the S7 extension would be ready by 2020. 

Below: since September 2013, these lights have been on, day and night, for over eight and half years. Meanwhile, the local street-art community has been busy. You don't see graffiti on the walls of most tunnels (Wisłostrada, for example), because they are opened soon after completion.

Below: out in the open, the view drivers will have as they prepare to sweep to the right and merge with the S2 westbound, visible in the distance. And then on to Poznań, Berlin and - ultimately - Lisbon.

Below: not really deserving the status of 'tunnel', the link between the S7 and S2 eastbound merely dives under the bridge carrying the Warsaw-Radom railway line. Again, this sliproad has stood idle since being completed in 2013.

Below: abandoned railway infrastructure. Unlike the old signal box, some 80m to the north, this building (I guess a machine room operating the switchgear?) has survived. The signal box was demolished in 2017 during the modernisation work of the Warsaw-Radom railway, its role supplanted by a new digitally enabled control-centre just north of W-wa Okęcie station. Overhead, a KLM Cityhopper Embraer ERJ 190 on final approach, and hurrying south, a Koleje Mazowieckie train on its way to Radom.

If I go in there, I'll see goodness knows what. Let's go and look. There's always some trepidation when entering abandoned buildings; there may be ne'er-do-wells within. But consciously precluding that possibility, I enter. Uninhabited. And amazingly devoid of empty bottles and tins - the outdoor-drinking community are put off by the prospect of having to cross three railway tracks or an expressway.

Below: the same artists that daubed the tunnel?

Below: Google Earth is amazing. The 3D imagery extends well south of Warsaw Okęcie, this view is stunning. North is in the top-right corner.

Below: finally, the same junction, in full, from Open Street Maps. I've marked in red the sections photographed; the south-to-west sliproad and tunnel, the abandoned railway building and the short south-to-east sliproad.

This time last year:
Joys of Spring

This time two years ago:
Jeziorki in May

This time three years ago:

Spitalfields and Smithfields - more from London

This time five years ago

That tune going round your head now...

This time six years ago:
The eyes... the eyes... 

This time seven years ago:
New old terminal open at Okęcie airport

This time nine years ago:
Arrogance vs. humility 

This time ten years ago:
Warsaw looking good ahead of the football-fan influx

This time 11 years ago:
Heron over Jeziorki

This time 15 years ago:
Present rising, future loading

Further S7 extension progress

Getting tantalisingly close to the finish, two years and four months since the first scraping away of the topsoil, the S7 extension, there's talk about opening at least the northern section by next month. I'll believe it when I hear the traffic's roar. In the meantime, some final strolls around the site and its environs...

Below: "S79, I'd like you to meet the S7 extension"... South Warsaw's equivalent of Promontory, Utah, where the two ends of the transcontinental railroad met. To the left, the S79 takes you into Warsaw; take the right-hand exit for Belarus and Russia, or turn left and carry on along the S2 for Berlin and Lisbon, or swing north around Warsaw for Gdańsk and Scandinavia. To the right, straight through to Kraków, Slovakia and the Balkans beyond.

Below: at the junction of the western service road, which connects Dawidy Bankowe with Dawidy, work is almost complete. Fencing separates the S7 from surrounding land, yellow posts mark out the boundary of the land for the road ('pas drogowy'); the final asphalt has been laid. Some pavement still needs to be finished, but the end is in sight. 

The service road that runs parallel to the S7 on the eastern side is also nearly ready. Again, the pavement hasn't yet been laid end to end, but the asphalt is down - and to my surprise - the signposts are up! Below: from where the eastern service road meets ul. Baletowa, it's six kilometres to Raszyn ('Fool's Raszyn/Where angels fear to tread')... Raszyn, the Staines of the East

...and from Baletowa, via the new asphalt of the eastern service road, it's three kilometres to Zgorzała. Note the roadsign for gated level crossing - this is at W-wa Dawidy station. While the new road sign encourages curious drivers to take a look, the road is still closed; barriers remain in place.

The big news at the other end is that the pedestrian and cycle viaduct is now officially open. Below: looking west up the newly constructed ramp that meets the bridge structure. Behind me Zgorzała, ahead of me, across the S7, Zamienie. No stairs, just a long, gently sloped ramp at either end. Wide enough for cyclists to safely pass each other. The the left, the eastern service road that takes traffic down to Nowa Wola, bypassing the village of Zgorzała, which will feel massive relief when the S7 opens.

Below: from the top, looking south towards Lesznowola. The sign, translated literally, says: TEMPORARY CROSSING. WE ASK FOR CAUTION. DO NOT LEAN OVER ACROSS THE BARRIERS!! Presumably leaning over the barriers will be OK once the crossing becomes permanent. 

UPDATE 28 May 2022: Road signs are up on the S7 - a big development. Grójec - Radom - Kielce - Kraków, this sign would have been visible on the photo above, just before the curve in the distance.

And now, some bonus shots of planes landing on RWY 29, rarely used unless the much-longer RWY 33 is being repaired or, as happened yesterday, there are particularly strong winds from the west. This creates the opportunity of catching the planes against a backdrop of skyscrapers.

Below: a LOT Polish Airlines Embraer ERJ 175 flies in front of the Warsaw Hub and Spire buildings. In the foreground, W-wa Jeziorki station, a southbound train approaching. Photo taken from the viaduct over the tracks.

Left: LOT Polish Airlines Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner in livery commemorating the centenary of Poland's independence, which occurred three and half years ago. Taken at ground level from the S7's western service road north of ul. Baletowa, with the same cluster of skyscrapers as in the photo above. Beyond the treeline, Węzeł Lotnisko, where the S2 meets the S7/S79.

Below: a Finnair Embraer ERJ 190 coming in to land, flying in front of Varso tower. Taken from south of Baletowa, so from a greater distance. 

Below: A Wizz Air Airbus A321neo - something of a Supermarionation vibe here!

This time last year:

Town and country

This time two years ago:
Covid and economy recovery

This time three years ago:
Electric cars for hire by the minute

This time six years ago:
Mszczonów - another railway junction

This time ten years ago:
The Devil is in Doubt - short story, part I

This time 11 years ago:
Stormclouds are raging all around my door

This time 12 years ago:
Floods endanger Warsaw

This time 13 years ago:
Coal line rarity

The Speed of Life

There aren't enough hours in the day. I tend to take things slowly; tasks get interrupted by distractions, or put off to tomorrow - and even when I am doing them, there's no rush. I don't like panics; there must be air between tasks, life is to be enjoyed not hurried, and those distractions will always pop up. 

I prefer to take things easy. At my own pace. Eating - I'm usually the last to finish eating. I enjoy the process, especially when the food is good (and as I avoid bad food, this covers most of what I eat). Walking can be significantly speeded up with the aid of Nordic walking poles, an excellent accelerator - but I also like to dawdle, take photos, enjoy the view, contemplate nature. Ever since getting the Huawei health app on my phone, I can see that my 'moderate-to-high intensity' walking decreases markedly in summer, when the living is easy. The speed of life slows down for summer. And summer in the countryside is slower than winter in the city.

Procrastination is a huge problem for mankind, especially when you have no external deadlines hanging over you. An essential lesson for life is to impose your own meaningful deadlines. And to stick to them.

Being somewhat on the Asperger's spectrum, I find spreadsheets comforting, and for me tabling my daily exercise and dietary intake is an excellent deadline-maker. This has its downside. OK - so before going to bed, I need to finish my work, write a blog piece (or at least move it forward, process some photos if not actually publish), do my exercises. With things being put off towards 'later in the day', the last two or three hours are a rush to finish what needs finishing, while fighting off distractions. But then there is the immense satisfaction of closing my laptop with the day's spreadsheet filled in correctly; 11,000 paces, 20+ press-ups, 16+ pull-ups, 40 sit-ups, two sets of back extensions, three sets of exercises with 5kg weights, six minutes of holding the plank, and 40 squats. 

Incidentally, the squats are done usually in the morning, while the kettle boils. This is for the water to heat my coffee cup. I do this so that my espresso stays hot for longer, as I don't want to be gulping the coffee down, but enjoying it properly, not drinking it lukewarm. Logging the squats in the spreadsheet sets me up for the day; I push myself to get as many sets of exercise in before 17:00. But during the working week, often there isn't the time, so it gets bunched up into the evening.

Work has its own deadlines - you don't want to let down clients or colleagues, so things get done by when they need to get done. Over the years, I've learned to be more efficient, no longer having to spend so much time on stuff like researching background that by now I know well. Routine tasks are executed properly because of repetition.

Much as I don't like to admit this - I am a slow learner. But - having learnt a lesson, having acquired a deep insight and thorough understanding through experience, reading or from another person - I tend to learn it well. Solid foundations for future learning. But it's taking me so long! Stuff I should have known when I was in my late 20s, only falls in place now, as I'm in my mid-60s. [The internet - in particular Wikipedia - has opened doors to vast quantities of knowledge once accessible only through public libraries. A curious youngster today can tap into it at any time.]

We slow down as we age. Things take longer to do. My father, in his last years, in his mid-90s, would take an hour and half to eat his main meal of the day; he had an electric plate-warming tray on the table under his dinner plate.

I see speedy people, in a rush. They are efficient. They get things done quickly at work. Their work rate is exemplary. They can get five tasks done in the time it takes me to do two (with dawdling and distractions along the way). They deserve higher pay for that reason alone.

But at the end of the day, here's my question - if  'live fast, die young' is a motto - is the corollary true? 

This time last year:
Does it all come right in the end?

This time two years ago:

Self-discipline and creativity during the lockdown

This time three years ago:

Russia's Far East on road maps

This time four years ago:
Heavenly Jeziorki

This time eight years ago:
Why are all the shops shut today? 

This time nine years ago:
Jeziorki at its most beautiful

This time 11 years ago:
Useful and useless in my wallet

This time 12 years ago:
In search of the dream klimat - remote viewing made real

This time 13 years ago:
Zakopane to Kraków in 3hrs 45min

This time 14 years ago:
The year's most beautiful day?

Prime spring, Jakubowizna

Spring is the best season of the year; nature is fresh and green, exploding into life, and the warmth returns. Today, St Sophia's Day, is traditionally considered the end of the mid-May cold snap brought about by the Ice Saints (St Pancras, St Servatus and St Boniface - in Polish the 'cold gardeners' (zimni ogrodnicy). This year, temperatures exceeded 20C for four of the last five days, hitting 27C on Wednesday. Time to pop down to the działka and sample the joys of spring.

Below: setting off from W-wa Jeziorki this morning; I'm waiting for the southbound train to Chynów, approaching in the distance, while a train from Radom bound for Warsaw makes its way northward.

Below: landscape with orchard and railway, north of Chynów station

Below: one of the XII Canonical Views of Jakubowizna - the house on the corner of my street.

Below: another of the XII Canonical Views of Jakubowizna - the farm track coming off my street.

Below: a cherry tree buzzing with bees. I felt no discomfort in their presence; they were just getting on with their work, me - continuing on my walk. Click to enlarge.

Left: a lapwing (czajka), one of about nine or ten individuals I saw today flying around over the orchards to the east of the railway line between Chynów station and the DK50 at Nowe Grobice. 

Today is only the second time I've seen them around these parts; they used to be seen regularly in Jeziorki and Dawidy Bankowe, before work started on the S7 expressway extension. 

Very characteristic shape, call ('peewit') and flight characteristics.

Below: from my first ever visit to these parts back in 2014, I have come to associate hares with these orchards. This pair seemed elderly, but could still put on a burst of speed.

Below: market gardening, between Nowe Grobice and the DK50, much quieter now that the S2 tunnel under Ursynów has been opened and sanctions against Russia and Belarus start to hit trade in goods.

Below: the foreshortening effect of the 70-300mm zoom lens pulls together meadow and orchard in blossom, railway line and housing.

Below: quintessential Jakubowizna, the 'road' to Machcin II. I last walked this stretch six weeks ago when it was ankle deep in virgin snow.

Below: the farmhouse on the junction - if you are here, you're on the right road.

Below: my działka, looking its finest, full of forget-me-nots (which in Polish are niezapominajki - literally 'forget-me-nots'; they symbolise memory right across north-west Europe).

This time six years ago:
Classic car show, Nadarzyn

This time seven years ago:
Classic vehicles at London's VE-Day 70 celebrations

This time nine years ago:
Malodorous passengers on Warsaw's public transport

This time 11 years ago:
Inside Filtry - Warsaw's waterworks (Museum Night 2011)

This time 12 years ago:
Warsaw's Museum Night 2010

This time 13 years ago:
On Transcendence

A better tomorrow for the soul

It's been a long time since I came across a spiritually inclined scientist who could set out a vision of spiritual evolution that coincides so neatly with my own. From Wikipedia: "Itzhak Bentov (1923-1979) was an Israeli-American scientist, inventor, mystic and author. His inventions, including the steerable cardiac catheter, helped pioneer the biomedical engineering industry. He was also an early proponent of what has come to be referred to as consciousness studies and authored several books on the subject."

This short clip gives an idea of his main thesis regarding how we evolve not just biologically, but as consciousness. Sadly, little has survived of his TV appearances, but we get a good idea of his thinking. 

Tragically, he died in the crash of American Airlines Flight 191 shortly after take-off from Chicago O'Hare Airport in 1979, aged 56, in what was the worst non-terrorism-related aviation disaster to have taken place on US soil. Had he lived into this millennium (and why not - he was born a few months after my father), he could have contributed to the scientific discourse about consciousness in a meaningful way - there would have been many more interlocutors willing to take his ideas seriously and develop them.

An early modern-day panpsychist, he wrote "consciousness permeates everything".  

This time last year:
Blossom time in Jakubowizna - the apples

This time three years ago:

The Ice Saints - right on cue
[today - over 22C fourth day in a row]

This time seven years ago:
Then and now: Trafalgar Square (recreating my father's photos)

This time nine years ago:
Reflection upon the City Car

This time 11 years ago:
Biblical sky

This time 12 years ago:
Travel broadens the spirit

This time 13 years ago:
Welcome the Ice Saints

This time 15 years ago:
On the farm next door

How does a 'better tomorrow' look?

If we assume that this planet has another two and half billion or so years before the sun swallows it and at least another billion during which it will be habitable here, there's still a hell of a lot of future ahead of us! 

But how will that future look - better than the past, worse - or the same (after all we're only human)?

Homo sapiens has only been around for around 300,000 years - not even one three-thousandth of the time still left for this planet. Literature - the written form of storytelling - has only been developing for 4,000 years. The Industrial Revolution began some 250 years ago. How much further can we evolve as a species during that billion years we have left, before we're forced to move on? Or will we kill ourselves with nuclear weapons or runaway man-made climate change within the next few hundred years?

I'm an optimist; I believe that despite setbacks, man-made or natural, we will prevail, we will evolve, we will eventually reach out beyond our planet, our solar system, and go on to colonise space.

Intelligence, wisdom and kindness will win out over barbarism and stupidity. The long march of the evolution of consciousness is destined to continue as the Universe unfolds.

This may seem unlikely right now, considering the current outbreak of barbarism and stupidity in the Kremlin, but progress is generally two steps forward one step back.

Born in England the 1950s, the biggest part of my life has generally been the experience of an upward arc of human progress - material, technological and social. From the grey postwar years into the Swinging Sixties, the colourful consumerist 1970s; the 1980s London of Mrs Thatcher's Big Bang, the end of communism, the single European market, computers and smartphones, life had been getting steadily better, more interesting, diverse and richer in experiences and horizons, especially intellectual ones. Sadly, I believe that this particular upward arc peaked sometime around 2012-2013. History is cyclical. Since then, it has turned downwards; this is clear as we review events of the past decade, beginning with the aftermath of the financial crisis (that somehow bypassed Poland), Brexit, Trump, Xi, Putin and Covid - and now Putin unrestrained - and of course climate change. Dangerous populist ideologies, stupid people tampering with national policies

How will the future look? Will tomorrow be better? 

Not even our best minds are able to predict the future with any meaningful accuracy. Some of us can intuit the future better than others, but even so, this typically means getting one thing right for every two things we get wrong.

We couldn't even model the course of a pandemic. We can't see how Russia's invasion of Ukraine will end. (Hopefully with the departure of every last Russian military unit from Ukrainian soil.) But then what? Regime change in Russia? Reparations? Who will pay for the rebuilding of a shattered nation? How will Russia look after such a debacle? Right now, we haven't a clue.

But let's think about a deeper future. 2072. Fifty years on.

I'm optimistic. History is cyclical. [Another link] After the downturn, an upturn. We will progress, we will have learnt. Overcoming the challenge of man-made climate change and man-made disasters such as despotism, repression and war must be top of the human agenda.

I think the future will tend towards being less consumerist-oriented. There will be less 'stuff' in circulation. [Look at your mobile phone. It's a phone, a TV, a radio, a camera, a movie camera, a watch, a compass, a step-counter, a torch - individual bits of kit that are no longer needed.] Books will become a status symbol as consumption of reading material will happen more online; artificial intelligence will be bolstered by our own augmented intelligence. Example - access via one's mobile device to Wikipedia. A slightly simpler voice-activated interface will make it easier still.

The future will be greyer - but it will be more meaningful. Less gaily coloured plastic baubles. The look-and-feel of our future world will be more austere; showing off will be seen as infantile and egotistic. Conspicuous consumption, built-in obsolescence and 'keeping up with the Jones' are already a consigned to history, having peaked in the 1970s and '80s.

The rush to make money will be tempered by a greater respect for the fragile planet on which we live. Fewer privately owned cars, less exotic holidays. But a rush to live in temperate climes, to move away from unbearably hot zones. 

My hope is that people will learn to live in comfort and no longer chase after luxury, placing greater store on learning, skills, arts and crafts, science, philosophy and extraterrestrial exploration. The life sciences will flourish; who could have believed that a vaccine could have been rolled out globally within a year of a pandemic taking hold across humanity? The next decades will see advances in medical technology moving forward at a pace similar to than in IT since the 1980s. We'll see huge advances in longevity as we start to unravel the genetic mechanisms of ageing.

I'd like to think that in the longer term future, the levels of knowledge, wisdom and insight that I have achieved in my mid-60s will be standard across most 20 year-olds, who will only stand to grow wiser and more knowledgeable as their reach their 200s.

A stable population of five billion human beings, with natural population decline kicking in by the second half of this century will be sustainable.

Five billion people, at peace with themselves, at peace with each other, not obsessed with wealth and status but with acquiring knowledge and spiritual development.

This time last year:
Blossom time in Jakubowizna

This time two years ago:

Apple-blossom time in Jakubowizna

This time three years ago:
Busy doing nothin'

This time eight years ago:
Springtime pictorial

This time nine years ago:
Kitten time!

This time ten years ago:
Warsaw-Centrum to Jeziorki by train with super-wide lens

This time 11 years ago:
Loose Lips Sink Ships - part II

This time 12 years ago:
Jeziorki in the infra red 

This time 13 years ago:
Some rain, at last!

Hills... I gotta have hills.

Central Mazovia is pancake-flat. The horizon is at the same level whichever way you turn. In this, it's like Iowa, where to quote Bill Bryson "if you stand on two telephone directories, you have A View". Which generally, I don't mind from a flashback-familiarity point of view, those big skies remind me of the prairies... But the flatness means that hills are at a premium - even temporary, man-made hills...

Seeking a higher vantage point is instinctive in animals. Felusia's favourite place in the kitchen for example, is perched on top of the coffee machine - the highest point in the room - an ideal spot from which to observe human activity. Scrambling to the top of a man-made hill around these flat terrains to have a look around, a rest and a beer, has been a pleasant local activity in recent years, made possible by the civil engineering works going on in the neighbourhood.

Gone now is the ballast mountain (across the tracks opposite from the Jeziorki end of ulica Kórnicka). It stood here between 2016 and 2020 when PKP PLK was modernising the Warsaw-Radom railway line, and afforded good views to the north and south-east. Below: looking across at Jeziorki, the 'up' line awaiting new rails.

Gone too are the highest soil mountains that once stood astride the S7 extension works. Below, the one next to Węzeł Zamienie, between Jeziorki and Dawidy Bankowe. Photo taken on 3 May 2021 - amazing progress since then. Sadly, without this view-yielding mountain.

Below: view from the top of the soil mountain at the northern end of the S7 extension, where it meets the S79. 

Alas - these high places, and the views from them - have gone. These were favoured places of mine to scramble to the top of and enjoy a beer around sunset - the golden time of day.

It seems that hills are at a premium - even modest ones. Between Zgorzała and Zamienie, all the hills associated with the S7 extension works have been levelled with the ground - with two exceptions. Both are on private land (situated on either side of the expressway); both are now fenced in. Presumably the owners simply asked the builders not to remove them - and the builders happily obliged. Win-win.Builder saves costs of removal, landowner has a Feature. Below: the hill on the east side of the S7. Plant a few trees, make a path, bench at the top, make good - nice. [There are also two such man-made hills, leftovers from civil-engineering works, by the ponds in Jeziorki. The local 'ziggurats'.]

But there's still one range of soil hills remaining, west of the railway tracks a little way north of W-wa Jeziorki station. 

Sadly, although extensive in area, they are not very high (about four-and-half metres at the highest), but they are easy and safe to climb.

Below: the view is OK, nothing spectacular (certainly not when compared to the 12-metre-high hill that stood next to where Węzeł Zamienie now is, second photo from the top), but at least it's here and above ground level. But for how long? Until a new viaduct extends ul. Dawidowska across the railway? If so, it will be a while.

Below: my brother has rendered my photo taken from the Ballast Mountain looking north (seen originally here) in the style of German artist Anselm Kiefer, catching the atmosphere of the late afternoon in winter with a light frost and a dusting of snow.

The end-of-day pilgrimage requires a destination; the destination requires a vantage point, a spot for contemplation while watching the setting sun. 

The motorbiking season is soon to start, and with it the opportunity to explore further afield, beyond the reach of public transport.

This time last year:
Flashback to a Dream - subconsciousness and memory

This time 11 years ago:
'Old school' = pre-war

This time 12 years ago:
Britain chooses a coalition government

This time 13 years ago:
Landing over Ursynów

This time 14 years ago:
On being assertive in Poland