Climate Crisis Out My Window

We spent the last week with the local news on waiting to see if we were next in line for evacuation. 100 MPH wind gusts threatened to rip the awnings off the porch until I got them tethered down. Our shingles were all over the street. D was beside himself. I get sleepy in a crisis, so mostly I was struggling to stay awake. I don’t know why that is. It’s kind of a “well I’m going to lay down and die” mentality? Around 7PM D called our friends in Altadena, they were evacuating. I could only hear sobbing and crying on the other end of the line.

I think it truly hit me yesterday as we were loading smoke scented belongings into our guest room from one of our displaced friends. This is what the future looks like – for all of us – one crisis after another. An endless series of crisis made worse by political upheaval and climate catastrophes until finally civilization collapses. The idea of bringing children into a world like this seems immoral. And then there were the not-helpful comments made by cheap politicians trying to score cheap points. That somehow we mismanaged our way into this crisis. Like we somehow forgot to stop drought from happening, we somehow neglected preventing Santa Ana winds, on the alter of DEI or political correctness we allowed 2024 to be the hottest year on record. I’m not saying there were no mistakes but we are a nation without compassion. There’s a belief that if you just vote the right way or live in the right place nothing bad will happen to you. And yet Texas loses power in the summer and the winter, somehow that’s tragic. California burns and that’s “just what they deserve.” This crisis is here for all of us and it doesn’t care who you voted for.