Entropy

Bleak, featureless - yet timeless. The river Roach
flowing up towards the Crouch.

The last twelve to ten years or so has brought with it a lot of change, some good - most bad. In my opinion however, most of that change has been done with little consideration for the long-term future, with so called progress occurring for the sake of progress. A trend which only seems to be accelerating with time.

What's been banned, what can't I say, what gadget is now a must purchase, what global turmoil has completely changed the socio-political landscape? I find it hard to keep track of all the changes these days.

But even if you choose social isolation as a solution to the endless stress caused by endless Progress and all its trappings, you still can't ignore the negative direction everything is going in. The demographic changes in the country are a hard one not to notice, as are the disturbing trends in favour of every perverse rejection of natural law. How this will all end is anyone's guess, but for the moment I suppose its best not to worry about it too much. Better to get on with positive things, right?

Well I've tried that and not convinced it works. Take the other day as an example, as I braved the local town to do a spot of research on local history, where within the space of half an hour I came across multiple transsexuals, all of whom had disturbingly chiselled jawlines, and overheard a conversation about a teenage pregnancy that was the result of a six-way spitroasting after a night out in a Wetherspoons! Now I'm not a prude or closeminded by any means, but it all just made me realise why I rarely venture out anymore. I don't understand what on earth is happening anymore.

Photo taken on an awful bridge camera
I had back in 2006, before I knew much
about photography at all.

As time goes on the crowds are becoming something I need to avoid for my own sanity. I'm certainly not old yet, but I feel it. The peculiarities of folk is now becoming too much to bare, and with the ironically bigoted bias against people such as me who aren't following the politically correct guidelines (which seem to be updated once a month and therefore nigh-on impossible to adjust to,) we're quickly being pushed out of society anyway whether we wanted to be or not. If pubs hadn't been destroyed by beer tax and the smoking ban, maybe there would have been somewhere us outcasts could have gone and spoken freely at, (which leads me to believe that the pubs were brought down purposefully for that very reason!)

The only place I have left to go that doesn't fill me with anxiety and dread is the countryside, but even then that's not a given, and I often end up effing and blinding at the housing developments around my area which are slowly but surely devouring the green belt and expanding London like a great tumour upon this green and pleasant land. The Essex marshes however are different, they're permanent. Unchanging. Dependable, and most importantly, worthless to housing developers. If you know what the tides are up to then nothing will surprise you, and over the past few years as I've gotten into wildlife videography I've grown to love this more or less untainted oasis of life on the outer reaches of an otherwise depressingly modern and built-up area.

I took a walk earlier today along the river Roach at Paglesham. The smell of the salt marshes and the familiar peep calls of the Oystercatchers on the wind always helps put my mind at ease. Along my travels I came across the remains of an old lifeboat that has been a permanent fixture there for many years. Funnily enough it was only a few weeks ago that I was sorting through some of my old photos that I'd taken circa 2006 when I was just getting into photography, and remembered that I had a photograph of this boat from back then. Just for giggles I thought I'd take one today, just to see what the difference would be after twelve or so years. I remembered vaguely (although regrettably not exactly) the composition of the old photograph, framed up and shot away.

The sad old boat today. 

The difference between the photos was, well in a word, stark. When I got back it made me feel quite melancholy actually. Twelve years is a rather long time - yet it has blinked by at a disturbing and accelerating rate. All the changes in society, all the changes in my life, had all occurred whilst this poor boat had sat still and weathered the rain, the wind and the punishing effects of ultraviolet on fibreglass. It sounds stupid, but taking this photo kind of made me realise just how unaware of time we are.

Tomorrow never comes is phrase or quote that has been said in many different ways by many different authors and philosophers, but it is also true I think to say that there is no such thing as yesterday either. We live in a perpetual state that we call now; the past may complete our understanding of the present, but paradoxically our present can also change our understanding of the past. Time it seems is an illusion that isn't broken easily, nor very often - but once in a while you get something like this old boat that does, that illustrates the passage of time. And I have to say, it's both beautiful and terrifying at the same time.