Protesting in Toon

Saturday was a fine sunny day in mid-August for a walk around Toon, as Newcastle upon Tyne is known in the Geordie dialect. Now Toon is actually a small city, thanks to a cathedral, which defines the large town on the North side of the city. On the South side lies Gateshead, the poor relation, always struggling to keep up with their rivals over the wide river which once divided them. Of course, these days there are many fine bridges uniting the Geordies, plus a foot tunnel further East, though as far as football goes, Gateshead has a team of its own and a decent stadium, though the players were mostly semi-pro's and seeking promotion to full time careers with the Magpies or the Mackems, which is to say the black and whites and the red and white stripes on the shirts, separating Newcastle from Sunderland. This brings the divide and rule story back to Weardale and Stanhope, since the river Wear wends its way from here through Bishop Auckland and Durham City to the North Sea, where it disappears as a river with a name, though the fish which spawn in Weardale, returning from their wandering in the North Sea and maybe the North Atlantic Ocean, to die and leave the next generation of salmon and sea trout to go exploring, maybe ending up on the plate with chips or smoked, to preserve them for later ... or something.

Meanwhile, the walk from Heaton along the Ouseburn and over the landfill site now only a memory, led to Stepney Bank, where the burn returned, and a nostalgic visit to the community farm, now much improved and the stables where the daughters learned to ride horses when they were small. The younger one fell off and decided riding horses was not her thing, while the elder persevered and kept getting back on, only fracturing her shoulder much later, by which time she was happy to accept the risks involved in riding dangerous mammals, and even bonding with them and canines too, as she embraced the rural life, whilst her sister loved Toon ... which didn't mean she stayed there all the time, since her love of adventure and risk taking led her to explore far and wide, including Australia, Cambodia, Vietnam, Penang, Thailand, Myanmar and even Sunderland, where she currently works at the job she enjoys, baking cakes ... though she draws the line at actually living South of the Tyne, and commutes on the Metro from Toon, where she resides.

Anyway, none of these reminiscences take us to the existential crisis facing humanity today, do they? So, a walk along the Tyne and up to the Civic Centre, to join the mob of protestors gathered there to assert the right to freedom of expression and an end to the oppression of the past year and a half, led to the interesting manouevre of the constabulary, policing by consent as one officer affirmed to your protesting old blogger, blocking the entrance to the pedestrianised Northumberland Street, previously the Great North Road, or A1, before the traffic needed wider roads to get round Toon instead of through it. This seemed quite provocative and batons were drawn to confirm the public servants meant business, leading to hotheads to object to the insubordination and push back at the usurpers in uniform, though without guns. Of course, this altercation just confirmed that the servants of the public, including local and national governments had indeed gone rogue, and the illusion of democracy was exposed as a farce at last.

Hey ho, on we go, playing human games, which is what humans do, to pass the time between being born and dying, which is only the blink of an eye in evolutionary time. .. bringing Sunday's post to a message of hope, not only in Stanhope, or Hexham, but via the Hopi prophecy that Christopher Columbus made an egregious error treating the sacred land of their ancestors as a dumping ground for all sorts of folks from Europe and beyond seeking freedom from oppression by the Catholic Christian Authorities burning heretics to confirm that Jesus loved them so much they must obey the Pope, a bloke. And, let's face facts, if you want compassionate guidance, would you honestly put a man in charge of anything? It's men who think war is a good way to settle disagreements, not mothers of young men returning with posthumous medals, isn't it? I mean, really, who on Earth thinks Boris Johnson is safe taking care of us, and has the interests of the masses as a priority?

Time to see the Tribe of warriors in Hexham again, since it's Sunday, and the clan gathers at ten to discuss the vital issues developing in the weird world of the humans ...