I'm Not Going To Talk about That

I’m not going to talk about global climate change any more. When I do, people look at me strangely and change the subject. They would rather talk about their most recent vacation or where they will fly next time. They couldn’t care less about global climate change, which is staring us in the face, while we watch football games on TV or read a really good historical novel.

Not everyone is uncaring, though. Twenty-five percent of Americans favor civil disobedience to protest our government’s lack of action on climate change. A Google search for “climate change civil disobedience” yields 313,000 hits. Some are duplicates, of course, but clearly there’s a powerful movement afoot. I’m not going to talk about that either.

I’m not going to talk about NOAA’s chief scientist, who urges civil disobedience against the burning of coal. I’m not going to mention that the Sierra Club has called for civil disobedience against climate change.  I’m not going to acknowledge that scientists, priests, geologists and many others have been arrested and done jail time for protesting against climate change. Nope, you won’t hear it from me.

Instead I’m going to post pretty pictures of food and pretend that climate change is not serious or even real.

Parsley Salad with Pickled Egg Garnish

 Leek Slices

If you're concerned about climate change, if you hope to preserve the world as we know it for posterity, if you are looking for someone to inspire you to join the protest, don't look to me because I'm not going to talk about that. 

Copyright 2013 by Shirley Domer

I Pinned My Hopes on El Nino

At some point in the miserable, hot, dry late summer I heard a news report that NOAA was predicting the return of El Nino, a warming of Pacific water that somehow brings rain to Kansas and other inner-continent states. 

We’ve been in a La Nina phase for almost two years now. La Nina is a bitch who tries to turn Kansas into a desert, so I was happy to hear that El Nino would be returning, bringing an end to our drought. I pinned my hopes on El Nino.

This morning Dennis said that “Kansas rain” was falling. We now consider a sheen of moisture that condenses on the concrete driveway and stone walkways to be Kansas rain. The sheen then evaporates.

I assured Dennis that El Nino was coming to save the day. But then I thought, “Shouldn’t he be here by now?” so I checked the Internet. Whoops! NOAA has canceled its El Nino prediction. Instead we will have neither El Nino or La Nina, but  “La Nada,” the nothing. I’m not joking; that’s what it’s called.

I’m disappointed and will not pin my hopes on a NOAA prediction again. El Nino is a tease, if you ask me.

But, hey, isn’t it odd that both our east and west coasts are being flooded with water from the sky while our continent’s inner core is drying up and could soon become a desert? Oh, what changes that would bring to our so-called civilization! 

If only I hadn't read about geology, which reminded me that our inner continent was once an inland sea, teeming with creatures whose skeletons are preserved as fossils in the stone wall that separates our back yard from the woods. 

All is change.

Copyright 2012 by Shirley Domer

I've Got The Existential Blues

I wish I hadn’t read about geology as a distraction from the presidential campaign. Geology, I thought, would give me a different perspective. My view of time would zoom far, far out and I would see the election as less important.

Indeed, that happened, but I got more than I bargained for. By reading the geological history of Earth I came to realize that human beings are destined for extinction, no matter what we do, just as so many species have been before us. I also realized anew that what we humans are doing is accelerating our inevitable demise. Our numbers are too great. Earth simply cannot support her ever-growing human population in the style to which we have come accustomed and now consider our entitlement.

The staggering changes we have wrought on our environment since the Industrial Revolution have come rapidly and continue with great momentum. Climate change is upon us and we are unprepared for it. Many of us deny it. Among the realists, some of us try to do what we can to delay the disaster. We recycle and ride bikes. We carry reusable bags to the grocery store and learn to drive our cars for fuel efficiency instead of speed. But not enough of us are trying and what little we do is a drop in the ocean.

I’ve long taken the existential view that my actions make a difference in the world and that it is my moral duty to choose my actions carefully. I have believed that if I and others take collective action we could turn the tide of climate change or at least slow it down. But from the viewpoint of geological time, I see that it can’t be done. There isn’t time. We are destroying in a few human generations an environment that took billions of years to develop. Sea levels will rise, coastal communities will be devastated and Kansas will be part of the Great American Desert. The oceans will become acidic and destroy the marine food chain. The ozone layer will become Swiss cheese. And so on…

When the existentialist realizes that nothing she can do will change the inevitable, she gets the existential blues.

Copyright 2012 by Shirley Domer

Helpless

This morning, already edgy from the endless heat, I read a New York Times opinion piece by Mark Bittman, "Endless Summer." http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/18/the-endless-summer/ It brought tears to my eyes and a vision of what climate change will unleash upon us all.

I was fired up to write an appeal to America to wake up and smell the coffee, to make radical changes in our way of life, but then my practical side turned to thoughts of what we individual Americans might do to change course. I couldn't think of any actions we might take to overcome the complete power of big business. How can we as a people insist that we invest in benign forms of energy production, that conservation be encouraged, and that we begin to fulfill our obligations under the Kyoto Treaty, which George Bush reneged on. Business, now a person under rule of our Supreme Court, owns our government. They bought it with permission of the court and the cooperation of our federal government. There was no point in urging my fellow Americans to take action.

So I lay down on my bed, my refuge, to calm down. The ceiling and walls of the room are perfect meditation foci. Their angles and gentle color variations sooth my spirit. I floated.

When I felt restored, I thought of Candide, who roamed the earth finding trouble everywhere. He ended up back at home, tending his garden. When there's no viable course of action on the big stage, I remembered once again that I should do as Voltaire advised, tend my garden.

Unfortunately, there's not much garden to tend this summer, but the onions and shallots had been drying for three weeks and were ready for storage. I went to work, cleaning the shallots and filling a basket with them. Then I braided the onions, which look pretty if I do say so myself. Soon we will move them to the basement's cooler environment.

Next best to tending one's garden is baking, so I made a pie – blueberry with a peach thrown in for variety. By this time I was in a whimsical mood.

Yes, I used an electric oven that draws power from a coal-fired plant north of Lawrence, so I did my bit to further change our climate. And yes, the heat pump was cooling the house. I'm sorry. I'll do the best I can to live modestly and conservatively (in the true sense of the word) and hope others are doing the same. At the same time I hope to live happily in the moment.