We are going green

Tear up that grass, hew down that tree, for we are going green. Burn the bushes, spray weed-killer, for we are going green. Mix sand and quicklime, pummel stones to fine gravel, fill the air with fumes as we mix and pour the concrete, for we are going green.

The new electric car needs a charger and a driveway on which to charge it, so that front garden, though we loved it, must go. There is no space for lawns, herbaceous borders, hedging, in the new, green household.

We are of course of the comfortable Middle Class in our regulation Metro-Land home, we who understand how important these things are, as they are, and everyone must conform for their own good as well as that of the planet. Everyone who has a driveway will have a charger, and those who have none must concrete their front gardens.

I do not wish to recall the time I lived in a terrace house and parked on the road, as it might make me think about how I could have plugged the car in then. Presumably in streets up and down the land we will see cables strung across the pavement like a seething mass of snakes, and pedestrians will have to find another way by.

As for those who live in flats, are the cables long enough, or will the car have to dangle from a seventh floor window?

There are those who are fortunately enough to rent garages of course, and such a person may install his charger there, until the council terminates his lease to build flats on the land instead, which will be a fine sight to see, standing tall (with cars dangling out of its windows).

We, however, when the concrete dries, are going green.