Happy to be at George’s party
I dream that I am an envoy from the planet Utopia just arrived on Earth. Having asked to be taken to the leader, I am introduced to an orange oaf whose staff seem to be a nest of vipers.
Across a large and stormy ocean I see a country arguing on a 50/50 vote whether to leave or stay with a mutually beneficial association they had been in for years.
Nearby, another country’s infrastructure is being destroyed by residents complaining about the cost of living, apparently unaware their behaviour adds to the cost.
Elsewhere, a smaller country is being ruined by its land being used to produce protein in the most inefficient manner in our known universe, dairying.
Plastics and global climate change are twin dangers to life on this planet. How can this race have wreaked so much damage in so short a time?
There are many distinct races among humanity, and it is apparent some deliberately find excuses to hate each other. How otherwise can you explain two world wars in two generations? Tribes envy the wealth of their neighbours and the stronger oppress the weaker for gain. The stronger within each tribe commandeer the wealth of their fellows, forcing an underclass.
Political power is competed for so that politicians, claiming to advance the cause of the people, gain wealth and power for themselves and their families.
On the planet Utopia, all work for the common good. We have no concept of divinity, which we have found to divide tribes by promoting argument in which any opinion is unprovable. The difference between right and wrong is made obvious by asking: ‘‘What is best for the weakest among us?’’
The same question is used when discussing progress of the fate of our world. All agree: there should be no significant dissension, and therefore no need for competing political forces.
I wake, saddened, knowing the genie is out of the bottle and we are stuck with what we have. It seems
Tminutes with George and his remarkable six-piece band. Each of them was so obviously absorbed in the music, so adept at engaging the sellout audience, so enjoying the experience, it was a joy.
The thing about being in that band is you’d have plenty of breaks from the high energy of the songs, while he tells the stories so integral to the songs, because he’s been clear that he needs the experiences, the observations, the travel, to generate the songs.
And it was during one of those stories, about the month he spent renting a room in a house in Barcelona, occupied largely by fellow creative types, that I felt a real kinship with George Ezra Barnett, despite being more than