Spare A Thought

Whenever a major public construction project such as a motorway or a power station is planned there are howls of protest from many people. Destroying the environment! Riding roughshod over local opinion! Noise! Pollution! Rowdiness! Lives and businesses ruined by central government diktat!

Strangely enough whenever the same public work is demolished you get the same people protesting again. Destroying history! Ruining local businesses which depend on it! Demolition noise! Demolition pollution! Rowdiness! Local community destroyed by a planning process they were not involved in!

We have all wept over the loss of beautiful woodland and traditional villages and crafts. We have all watched as a dying community has reinvented itself in a new way. We have all watched as a new culture has gradually replaced an old one so that the community is defined by what it does now rather than what it used to do before. No one knows what practical things will happen at any one time. We want to replace romance with romance if we have to lose it at all and ignore the fact it takes time to develop any sort of culture particularly when we are doing all we can to resist it.

Spare a thought therefore for the lost communities of the M25. The different creatures which have developed as a result of the building of the London Orbital Motorway and all the others. The ones whose presence and activities are vital in maintaining the ecosystem of the area. The ones without whom they would have no identity and whose destruction in the demolition of the motorways would make every civilized value crash down around them.

Every motorway has it Bolt Mites. These are a breed of insect which has developed from the field flies that used to live there before. They differ from their predecessors in having developed thicker and stronger legs culminating in sharp claws. They spend their days flying from bolt to bolt on the crash barriers and sitting on them with their legs draped around them. After a few seconds this tightens the bolt and prevents it shearing in the event of impact. After sitting on a bolt they excrete a mixture of dust and sweat which is then eaten by the next bolt mite. So the system continues to the great benefit of motorists and mites alike.

Every motorway also has its Mechanical Daffodils. Where once there were fields of flowers generating oxygen there are now rows of yellow mechanical flowers which seek out sustenance on their own little runners. Rather than staying in one place as their predecessors were obliged to do these roll up and down sucking the excess oil from the air to keep themselves healthy and reduce pollution and the possibility of accidents for all of us. So potent is the oil that mechanical daffodils are much larger than the originals and appear to be gathering in larger groups even though they move around. You often see them beside motorways and railway tracks where they stand out gaily with their serrated heads and the letters JCB protruding from them. These letters are a defence mechanism which has developed in place of thorns. They are a subliminally acting exhortation to "Jump, C**ks**king Bastard".

Motorway users frequently ask the question "who is growing those cones?" These small hills of orange or red tend to proliferate in difficult weather conditions and certain sections of the motorway are closed to traffic in order to grow them. Contrary to popular belief they are not fed and watered by the men in fluorescent coats usually seen drinking tea beside them. This task is left to the Cone Leeches. Once the cones were left to fend for themselves and were always perceived as being one single colour all the way down. Now these glossy tripe-coloured mammals wrap themselves around their middles to protect them. Their shiny coats act as reflectors of heat and light thus cooling the temperature of the cones which would otherwise wither in the hot exhaust fumes and smoking traction burns of the passing cars. The same coats are slimy on both sides thus conveying essential nutrients to the cones and warding off predators such as abandoned dogs whose noses stick to the sides of the cone leeches. In recent times the cone leeches have been joined by a second species. This is the Giant Ring Grub which attaches itself to the base of the cone. This provides a link between cone and concrete ensuring that the water in the man made substance can be siphoned up into the cone whilst passing excreta the other way to revivify the concrete itself.

Maybe the shortsighted protestors who are unable to grasp the emergence of these new environments should ask themselves a question. Would they want to perform the same function as the Bolt Mite, Mechanical Daffodil, Cone Leech or Giant Ring Grub? Nature has provided what man will not provide for himself. Truth and righteousness will always win. Once again all the fundamentals of existence are demonstrated to be the opposite of what we choose to believe for our own selfish and prejudiced reasons.