Over the last few weeks I've stopped wanting to read the news. Trump's antics (except you can't use a word like 'antics' when the consequences are so significant) and the path our government is determined to push this country down feel beyond depressing.

I feel like New Zealand is at its second major turning point in my lifetime. The first was the end of the 1980s, when everything changed. The dollar was floated, state assets were sold off, and everything that could be made into a corporate model was. The restructuring party only ground to a halt when we were close to corporatising health and education when Prime Minister David Lange, saw his Finance Minister (Roger Douglas) was on a track bearing little resemblance to the social conscience of the Labour Party. Lange ousted Douglas, who went on to form the ACT party (if you haven't listened to it, I  recommend Juggernaut, the story of the fourth Labour Government).

Without a doubt, by the 1980s things needed to change. New Zealand was locked into stasis - prices were locked down, wages were locked down, the dollar was locked down. The world started changing in the 1970s and New Zealand reacted with rigidity. Our long term major trading partner, the UK, joined the EU. Oil price shocks contributed to inflation peaking at 18%. Marilyn Waring crossed the floor, brought down the National government and Lange and Douglas initiated reforms which seemed inevitable and necessary. Those reforms have shaped the New Zealand of today, for good and bad. They tore apart our social support system while launching us into nearly three decades of good economic times.

The world is changing again, and it looks like the three decades of good times are over. COVID-19 created a tipping point, over which the world's wealthy economies, including our own, have fallen into a period of economic instability, inflation and recession. Governments around the world are whipping the ailing economic horses; we must regain heady heights of growth. In New Zealand, we see a reprise of Douglas's economic practices but this time in a right-wing government which won't curb ACT-promoted actions and values. Our government says we must achieve growth through...mining (screw the environment)...developing land (ditto)...increasing tourism (ditto)...doing more R&D...building new runways (more screw the environment)...building new roads (ditto)...selling off assets...cutting benefits...speeding up traffic. We must do Something. Anything. Quick!

I could write about how economic growth is linked inextricably with energy. I could write about how infinite growth isn't possible on a finite planet, though Herman Daly has written the book on that. I could write about how the demands of de-carbonising are constraining energy supply will inevitably reduce the amount of energy available to humans because renewables aren't as energy dense as fossil fuels. I could write about how 'renewables' aren't actually renewable – the energy source may be renewable (solar, wind, tidal) but the way we gather the energy is not renewable. There's so many things I could write about...

...but I'd rather write about the mountains.

Why does being in the mountains seem more real than anything? More real than paid employment. More real than railing against all the things about which I can do nothing.

We tramped for four days, from the Matukituki Valley near Wanaka, over Cascade Saddle to Dart Hut and then out the Rees Valley. The weather was beautiful and the views were stunning and I caught my breath. The world came back into focus with sharp-edged beauty. A world of speedy umber crickets leaping over my tramping boots. A world of glinting mica flakes spinning in a river eddy. A world of sweet-scented white and purple broom and hebe meadows with jagged ridges towering above. A world where a robin becomes your friend for the night, pecking worms from beech litter under your tent fly interspersed then using the fly as a trampoline. A world where you carry everything you possess and it has to be enough because there is nothing more.