Just went for walk on beach. Specifically not a beach so much as a fairly evenly distributed mix of rocks and sand and more rocks. Moon is doing what the sun does in summer at the moment, and was riding very high (almost directly overhead). Noone around at all, cept me.
I miss Aro Valley much. I really liked living somewhere where the majority of my friends and memories (and a fair chunk of my family) are. It is comforting, and due to being so close to town, is also full of promise of interesting things to do.
But it is indecently pleasing to be able to put on scarf and walk about in the big blue nothing and listen to the waves on the beach. I'm often aware of the history of Moa Point, in terms of there having being two Maori settlements nearby. I can imagine people walking around the same area fishing from the rocks or collecting shellfish or flax. Mostly I am aware of the sea as an active part of the people-oriented geography. Maori would have been paddling past Moa Point on their way round to Makara or Titahi Bay or heading over to the Wairarapa. The sea dominates everything around here (only slightly less than the airplanes and the sewerage).
As someone who tends to be aware of history, this connection with a time prior to the Treaty enables me to make sense of the land. It is partly important as it gives me a sense of belonging, and it is also important as it enables me to acknowledge the lives of the people who were here before me. I've often found that New Zealand feels dissociated from itself, as if it just plopped out of the sky 150 years ago and before that there might have been some birds or something. Perhaps it is part of my european heritage that insists that there must have been something here before that. Perhaps it is just a sense of being in someone's living room without having been introduced.
Either way, it is a truely beautiful place and I feel embarrased by the luxury of it all. At some point I'll sort out my wetsuit and go for a midnight kayak. :-)
.carla
Posted by carla at July 10, 2003 11:07 PM