DESKS

The problem with filing cabinets is where to put the things that do not fit into a nice category – or maybe into several.

What I will say is that everyone I knew with a tidy desk had no, or little, creativity. Nature did not design us to be tidy!

Tidiness and nature. Nature does not have straight lines and neat homogenise ecosystems. It is an environment of flux, constantly changing the parameters with climate and tectonics, biological boom and bust, and many other factors (my way of disguising my ignorance). Species of all types are constantly trying to expand into the territories of others, or being pushed back in their own niche. This is natures way -one year lemmings, then then next more foxes, boom years for butterflies followed by poor ones.

And then humans interfered. farmers could not be happy with weeding and limited pest control – no they demanded total control and the result is the devastation to the species of our natural world. Farms are becoming increasingly tidy, maximising profits oil all. And then when a subsidy for wildlife is provided, an equally distinct area is provided to maximise the grant available.

Silicone valley has become famous for ‘disruption theory’ – i.e. come up with newer and better ways of doing things. Personally I think this is rather neat (adverb not noun!). Di please correct this if wrong, I was in set 5 of 5 for English in a Tech High School (not very academic!). Perhaps we need a ‘correction theory’ – one which compensates a farmer for losing a set % of his crop through natural wastage – i.e. not by setting aside some land whilst continuing to blitz the rest with the strongest chemicals allowed, but by accepting that some of a crop will be lost to the natural world. Of course we would need recourse to ensure the balance does not get out of hand, but proportionality would be a key here.

On which thought – the worlds population continues to expand, albeit at a slower rate, and disproportionality between areas (Countries in central and North Africa faster than countries like Italy and Japan which have falling populations). I think I am right in saying that diseases like HIV/AIDS, SARS, COVID, and many more are transmitted from the animal world into the human world by our invasion of pristine, virgin environments where basically humans have no place! It does not matter which ‘country’ it started in, more what was the encroachment that led to the jump from the natural world into ours. Here you might ask why our world is not the natural world – work it out for yourself!

So back to the start – tidiness. I once saw Chris Baines show slides of a play park in London next to what was a former bomb site. The play park was empty – sterile swings, etc. but the bomb site with a dumped settee was used by children for the most imaginative games. Wildfowl in the Severn Estuary feed on human/animal waste which fertilises the mudflats, we can be too tidy! Although I still regard it as a four letter word!

So do not tidy everything in the garden, Leave piles of prunings. If possible get some tree cuttings to just be there and rot away.

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