whitstable by katharine eastman
Obviously I am crazily eccentric and odd and people tend to shy away from me and if it wasn't for the fact that I am arrogant I would probably think that it was me and not you (them), but, yes, I just think that the whole world has gone bonkers and there's nothing I can do about it so blah blah blah. I buy the occasional newspaper. On Sunday the Observer mag had an article by a young man saying that other young people are throwing away their phones and going around using maps and they have taken up hitch-hiking again, and to prove it his article was about him going from Penzance to the north coast of Scotland and I have read The Salt Path so didnae pay it no heed, everything is a lie.
But he was right, what he said. When you throw technology away you then have to talk to strangers and that reminds you that people are okay. Sure, they are waaaaay more wary now than they used to be, more nervous, more monosyllabic, women will run away, men will apologise for something I did, they're all being made miserable by their devices, but that is their choice.
I do get these sudden twinges of realising how far we've all gone off the map. Yesterday, while returning from my wonderful holiday in Kent (you may have heard ....) the minibus driver announced to us all in the motorway service station that we should all be back at the van at 1pm. I've never worn a watch and don't have a phone and there wasn't some huge BigBenny tower nearby displaying the time so quick as a flash I asked the group around me What's The Time Now ? and though everyone was kind, they smiled, they tolerated me, they even felt sorry for me, I could feel their complete bafflement that someone could ask such a dumb question in 2025.
What would my next question be ? - where am I ? - what year is it ? - what is the name of this planet ? And I do see their point of view - why should I, a non-watch-owner & non-mobe-owner, hitch a ride on the lives of people who have taken the trouble to work and save and buy a watch and a mobe ? What next ? - me decide not to own a car and instead to hitch rides from people who have worked hard to get a car ? It is shocking and I do try never to bother people about the time, and the last time I tried to hitch a ride ? - ooooh decades ago - though to my credit I always gave rides to hitchhikers when I could - but god, no, when an Uber costs about £3 to take you to a new life and even tells you the driver's name before you've met her - what is the point ?
It's all on the screen already - the whole world we used to grope for day by day, decade after decade, it is all there right from the birth of everyone coming along today and forevermore.
I'm afraid Whitstable didn't quite do it for me. Oh yes I could see that it has "character" and is unique and is mercifully scruffy - but it just felt like a Dickens novel in modern dress with modern tech and everyone going thru the motions. I think I'm being unfair. I think the sunshine spoiled it. It should've been raining and I should've been the only one there.
recorded this morning, photo Whitstable, Sunday
