After the rain

June 17th, 2023

There are issues and problems I have with my hometown. It’s provincial and parochial and plain and backward and over-developed and under-developed in exactly the wrong places. I still love it here, but I think I might be getting too used to what shouldn't be normal, to what I overlook because I see it constantly. Like in the photo above — an old house, overgrown with vines and slightly ajar doors I saw on my walk today after the rain stopped. Only after seeing the photo on a monitor did I notice empty cans and bottles on the ground, which ruined the effect I wanted to capture. This kind of garbage is everywhere just outside the main central areas and I no longer register it — and that is wrong.

But then there is that in the photo above. A lush, vibrant, and deep green wetlands. This is an example of nature at its best — bursting with life everywhere where there is an inch of space, some soil, sun, and water. And I took this photo standing on a pedestrian bridge 50 meters from a main thoroughfare, 400 meters from the main shopping mall, 1.5 kilometers from the city hall, and 1.8 kilometers from the historic city center. It is basically in the center of the city, accessible from everywhere, and yet — it is a sizable pure wilderness, left undeveloped only to nature and its designs — and that is right.

There is a love/hate relationship between me and my city. I know I won’t repair all that can be done to make it better. I know I won’t improve the people with whom I share living here. And I know living here and people here are exactly the same as I would find anywhere else. There will be some good and bad in every place in this world, and there will be some good and bad among people living everywhere in the world. Seeing the same faces and the same places only amplifies the bad, with good becoming a surprising interlude. I have my roots here very deep in the soil underneath my feet.