[1]

This is my birthplace - this town with its uncertainty of identity. There is nothing I can do about that. I might deplore the way things change and regret the passing of family holidays on the beach. I may moan with my other townsfolk about the Tropicana, and the new look Marine Lake - but I cannot deny that today a major feature of the town has gone.

Only two days ago I stood on its boards to take a photograph of the sunset - and now the pier is burnt down. The international press gathered, vulture like, to mix with local and national journalists and cameramen to witness its demise. Already that news has been displaced from the top line of the [2] BBC news to give way to another atrocity in Baghdad.

My town is news. I suppose I should feel proud. The dodgems and the slot-machines are literally melted away. The new owners who only recently decreed that you could only eat food purchased on the pier on the pier will doubtless have their own view of this tragedy. Perhaps when they rebuild it it will be a new wonder and a new reason for coming to the seaside resort. Perhaps it will be another Tropicana - waiting endlessly for planners to agree how it should be.

How often those things which we took for granted, passed frequently in our ordinary comings and goings, how often they are destroyed and life must go on. Today the local shops will trade on a bonus crowd of gawkers - tomorrow they will start to wonder about the effect on profits.

Not much in this life is immune from disaster. I need a God who creates each sunset and each tide to establish my life by His grace. Giving stability in such an ebb and flow of fortunes is what He does best.

[3]