Winter of our discontent?

Rietfontein in winter. Photo by Matilda

The first real cold spell of winter is upon us. I've moved from the desk where I was sitting when I could no longer feel my fingers and am now sitting on the edge of my bed with the sun gently thawing me through the window pane.
     Its a funny thing about South Africa: we have relatively short winters and in global terms they are rather temperate for most of the three month duration, with every now and again the arrival of a really cold spell that grips most of the country. It lasts for a day or three and then subsides, going back to cool at the most.
     Sunny South Africa, right?! The problem however, is that our buildings, especially residential dwellings, are not built in such a way that they are energy efficient and the cost of electricity and fuel being what it is, we tend to almost freeze inside our homes.
    We go outside in winter to warm up in the glorious winter sun! And our houses with their large windows (definitely not double glazed) sit in the shadows of evergreen gardens, shivering in their insufficient insulation and unable to store the lovely free heating that the sun so generously pour out on us, to keep us comfortable through the winter nights.
     The thinking goes: It will be spring in two months time. The house will bring in the new greenery through its wide windows, the air will be mellow and all this misery will be forgotten.
     It feels like such a waste. We waste energy on heating in winter, and I daresay, cooling in summer. We consume mindlessly.
     This is fast becoming a post like millions of others: complaining and warning about where we are heading. It is not my intention. I cannot add anything to the dialogue that hadn't already been said.
     So where is this taking me? Only this: Does the origin of all of this lie elsewhere? The way we are depleting the earth of all she has to sustain us with, while in the process squandering what is freely given and needn't be dug or drilled for, corresponds to the way we mismanage energy for our inner needs. How and where we seek and exploit in our search for the satisfaction of those needs.
     And all the while the Sun is shining.

Matilda