Test for eco

Today, several pieces of social media output converged upon a single point in time and space somewhere between my left and right ears. It was a critical mass of scientific information that pointed to the folly and fecklessness of our species, and which I could no longer ignore. The evidence has been there for ages, that's part of the problem, but it is also out of sight. So although the message has been trying hard to get through, it has often fallen short of the mark or not been tuned to the correct wavelength, possibly because we do not want to hear it, having raised prevarication to the status of an art form.

Firstly, a beach-combing Facebook page alerted me to a hitherto unknown initiative.

Then, another post, this time by global environmental campaigners Plastic Free July, provided a link to a blogpost concerning the dire consequences of our actions which affect sea birds.

Lastly, I searched for info on the 'hitherto unknown initiative'.

And here's the thing, for once, for a fleeting microsecond, for a distance measured in nanometres, I was ahead of the curve.

Slightly.

The previous weekend, we had been walking on the beach at the Sands o' Wright, in South Ronaldsay, when I spotted some small thing out of place. I bent down to pick it up, rolled it around in my hand, concluded that it was a tiny piece of plastic and, unthinkingly, stuck it in a coat pocket.

I have just retrieved the object from its forgotten resting place.

Yup, most likely a nurdle.

It's a tiny drop in the ocean, there's just way too much of it out there.

It's a tiny drop in the ocean, but it's a start.