Back on the #Mainland

The sun was forcing its warmth through the Autumn air as I strolled down the rocky path to the beach. I past a man in a blue coat, and greeted him cheerily. He growled a response and glared at me for apparently disturbing him. My afternoon day dream collapsed around me as I once again remembered where I was. I am back on the mainland, and this isn't a place where you have a good chat with everyone you meet, this isn't a place of shared experiences, of community. It is all too often a place of individuals and suspicious looks. But in my head I was still on Skomer and still in the mindset of saying hello to everyone, and ready to answer questions and chat about wildlife and island life.

I don't mind admitting I was really nervous about moving out to Skomer. It was understandable given the remoteness, lack of beach and waves, wondering if I'd be able to grow a relationship I'd just started. But what really surprised me was how anxious I felt about leaving the island. The stress of uncertainty about leaving dates and times due to the weather was something I'd grown accustomed to during my months on Skomer, but there was something else gnawing away at me. I was scared I'd become institutionalised.

I'd spent six months in less than a five square mile area with no cars, no shops, no cash machines, no adverts, and not many people. As the engines flared on the RIB taking me off the island, and seals splashed under water I realised I was nervous of "normal" world feeling alien. It hadn't taken long to adjust to Skomer, in part because we were all busy with work. But it felt like it might take more time to re-adjust to the mainland and to its concepts. On Skomer you do things yourself, you realise that the island could become a pressure cooker unless you respect and assist you fellow island residents, and you always take a minute to enjoy the view and breathe the fresh air.

On the mainland life is rushed by the trappings of modernity. Instant information and instant service has fuelled the growth of a society of individuals. People are in it for themselves. This realisation took me a while to get used to, and is in complete contrast to the necessary community spirit that developed on the island. I think I have adjusted to deal with the mainland again, but I fear I do not enjoy interacting with many of the people who inhabit it. Perhaps island life has in some way radicalised me. I do not yearn, as some environmentalists and communitarians do, for a less technological, more agrarian society. Technology has and will be part of the progress of society, but I fear its course is currently guided not by communal and social goals, but by capitalist need for individual profit.

Perhaps we should run a course on Skomer for app designers, Apple executives and the Tory cabinet...