Fair Day in February guided me to the Australian Museum in March. The rainbow lanyard around the neck of the customer service person reminded me of the institutional progressivism, and I put more effort into smiling, as I asked my questions.
‘Surviving Australia’ was the free exhibition that had drawn me in, and I learned that my country’s rural landscapes could be described as ‘surprisingly diverse’. That such a sizeable land mass has change both dramatic and incremental in the unfolding makes sense to me: diversity does not only belong inside boardrooms. Nature is the origin of a concept I associate most readily with humanity.
Here in the city, the animals that *can* survive artificial lighting at night, do. Those who can evade the prowl of feline pets live to see another day. Those that can find their meals with the help of rubbish bins, like ibises, co-exist with our taller, more potentially sophisticated species. Some humans choose to perceive themselves as uniquely distinct from nature. Others still walk back to something more intuitive: we *are* nature.
An awareness of global heating was appropriate towards the end - perhaps there is no animal more dangerous than the human being, given that we are driving extinction events. Those, too, appear incremental, dramatic, and everything in between. Unpredictable, yet we have the illusion of ever-increasing knowledge on the topic, due to our application of scientific methods. I fear for the future of the planet.
There are still possibilities for getting out of our own way and working *with* the rest of nature… I look for ways to do activism, and duly noted that the Australian Museum encourages letter writing to politicians. There seems to be a collective which has mobilised around this very lobbying. I only need to be mindful of Greta Thunberg’s impact to remember that I, too, have some sort of influence. You, too, can help.
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