Offline, sans wifi or phone reception while away in May in the NW Highlands, we did a lot of reading. This was mine:
RSPB – Badgers Guide
Nicholas Crane – “The Making of the British Landscape from the Ice Age to the present” (2017)
Naoki
Higasida – “Fall Down 7 Times Get Up 8”. Introduced by David Mitchell,
translated by KA Yoshida (his Japanese wife) and David Mitchell. Published in
UK 2017. Follows book by same author (s) published here in 2013, written when
NH 13y, “The Reason I Jump”.
RSPB – Badgers Guide - an overview of all things Badger, including their
geographical distribution, habitats and habits. Good and bad confluences and
run-ins / run-overs with humans; the complex controversial issue of bTB and
badger culling in an attempt to control it. All illustrated with good, clear
photos. I hadn't realised some English placenames pertain to badgers, including Brockenhurst in the New Forest, brock being another word for Badger. I've gone off sausage dogs, too. I hadn't twigged that their German name, Dachshund means literally, badger hound. They were bred small and sausage like to fit into the tunnels leading into badgers' setts and hound them out.
Nicholas Crane
Started while away, continued back home.
Begins with
a series of maps, 12,000BP – to the present (2010s). First three maps during
the millennia after the ice from the last ice age retreated from Britain.
Purely geographical, being the Mesolithic (Middle Stone Age). Some of the
detail intelligently made up, particularly river systems. The first map 10,000y
BCE (12,000y BP), Britain still uninhabited after the retreat of the Devensian
ice sheet which had rendered much of
Britain off-limits. Globally this glaciation ended 20,000y BP; and sea
levels were already rising. The map still shows an ice sheet covering
Scandinavia; and also a much smaller one of central Highland Scotland (the Loch
Lomond Stadial). Even if largely ice free, the hard tundra climate is inconducive to human hunter
gathering. Though global sea level is rising, Britain still joined to the
continent; and dry land drained by big rivers in what’s now the North Sea. The rapidly
warming, improving climate, though came at the cost of the low lying areas
submerging; on Doggerland with every tide and storm. The land link with Ireland
disappeared about 11,000BP; and Britain became cut off once again from the
Continent by 7000BP; Doggerland reduced to a few islands off East Anglia, which
quickly became submerged themselves. Land in the SE was also sinking due to
isostatic rebound of the crust after the ice had retreated. Even in a
hunter-gatherer society, it’s likely that people would have had a strong
attachment and sense of place, making the loss of landmarks of several
generations beneath the waves grievous.
Previously,
through the Pleistocene, waves of hominid incursions from the continent /
Doggerland during warmer interglacials. Earlier hominids pre-dating Homo
Sapiens, modern humans.
Reading
around elsewhere, Gupta etc.
I've always
had a fascination with the palaeography of Britain and the near continent
during the past few million years, particularly from about 3 million BP onwards;
ie the Pliocene, Pleistocene and Holocene periods. Particularly interesting to
see how river systems have changed, in numerous cases radical changes of
course; usually due to advancing / retreating ice sheets but also tectonic
forcing; and, of course, changing sea level.
Landscapes
/ Geo what ifs approx 3Ma rivers changing courses, islands
Loire 3Ma
BP (tectonic)
Geo-Brexit
1.0 – 450ka, 180ka megafloods Severn-Dee-Mersey last ice age – Ironbridge Gorge
and Industrial Revolution kick-off
Naoki Higasida
Still non-fiction, but different from the my usual readings on landscape, travel and nature. I bought this after reading The Reason I Jump, by the same author, published in 2013. NH has autism and is non-verbal. Much of his communication is via an alphabet grid. He wrote his first book when he was age 13. Like this one, it was introduced by David Mitchell, translated by KA Yoshida, motivated by trying to better understand their son who also has autism. The second book is again a first hand perspective describing his experiences of living and growing up with his form of autism; but now as a young adult.
As with writings on my reading generally, this isn't a review. There are plenty of those elsewhere. More my personal response and thoughts provoked:
Generally
short, clear and concisely chapters, necessitated
by NH's relatively slow / labour-intensive means of communicating nearly
everything he needs to say through an alphabet grid. Also make for easy, quick
reading (more than I'll say for Ian Sinclair's millennial M25 circuit, which
really was a slow crawl, read before coming away).
David Mitchell says - NH's
first book was generally well received, yet a minority took it to be a fraud / fake
because it flowed totally against their perceptions and understanding of
autism. Even some experts apparently.
Much of
what NH he says about caring for / living with / providing / attitudes to someone
like him with autism sans speech as a child and young man, applicable to many
other special needs at all ages, including older people hard of hearing; people
with so-called learning difficulties. Among them; well meaning people yet
limited aspirations / expections; school etc.
Meltdown
– don’t like the word in this context, but widely used for want of a better
one. All very well tutting and telling anyone in full meltdown to calm down and
get a grip is fruitless, pointless and can make things even worse. Too much
water in confluence simultaneously will raise the river into full flood; which
may hurt and inconvenience people. Yet once the flood is propagating
downstream, nothing can stop it. When too much rain, the river can’t help
bursting it’s banks. My analogy, not NH's but he’s fully aware of the upset and
inconvenience his meltdowns and other difficult behaviours cause those around
him.
Touching
words about parents and sister.
The Journey – perceptive, empathetic story
about someone with dementia.
Being
unable to communicate your needs and desires distressing, frustrating, scary
for everyone.
National
Autistic Society - 2016 Too Much Information. Videos making the
point of information overload / reduced ability to filter out /some senses
turned up to high causing some people with autism to feel overwhelmed. When
flood of information gets all too much, meltdown, eg busy noisy shopping areas
where so much stuff competing for attention. Even if verbal, can’t always
communicate what’s bothering them.
NH speaks of
a “collision” between strong emotions he finds hard / is unable to express and
trying to control them.
Given how
busy Tokyo / modern Japan is, I wonder how he deals with this. He doesn’t mention
sensory overload. Also curious about how he finds living with autism in Japan
particularly, with its busyness and culture. Most Japanese homes very cramped,
but no mention of the challenges that might impose, for instance. According to
him and DM, autism provision, understanding and tolerance of much better in
Japan and the UK (both sound about the same but don’t know how much funding for
support is an issue over there) than South Korea or France. Don’t know about
the first one, but read elsewhere it's way outdated and appalling in France.
Best case in NH's experience was the US, eg letting him into normally no-go
areas of museum's galleries to satiate an unusual but harmless fixation. Might
other gallery-goers see this as preferential treatment – they let him through,
but not my son; hey, we had to pay to come in here etc.
