It's been way too hot here today for any sort of comfort. Australians are supposed to cope well with the heat. I don't. I never have. Today it was 38 degrees where we park our cars and I felt like I couldn't breathe.
I live on the south coast because I don't like the heat, but the heat has followed me here. How was I supposed to know we were going to cook the planet in my lifetime? Today I watched the beautiful big leaves on my Tamarillo wilt and die before my eyes. In comparison I saw how much better the native plants were faring. The problem with that is that you can't eat most of them, and many of the ones you can eat don't taste that great, and there's a lot of work to make them edible. Australia is a hot dry continent. I hope migrant hopefuls take this into account before they try to escape COVID and move here.
I often wonder how parents feel about climate change. Every time I see a new baby I think to myself: 'I wonder if those parents REALLY thought/think about climate change.' I am told the instinct to breed is powerful. It must be if humans continue to deliver their kids into the fire that planet earth is fast becoming. It's terrifying. Forget about the afterlife, hell or purgatory - we are already there.
Image: Author. Original concept. Hand drawn, digitally coloured.
Living in NZ and seeing all those beautiful broad-leafed native plants really brought it home to me. They simply wouldn't survive in Australia, where critters evolve to conserve as much water in their system as possible. I rang the other guy on fire tower today and he said he'd just recorded his lowest ever relative humidity. We do regular weather recordings at work. A long hauler, he recorded 10%. Two days ago I recorded 22% and thought that was nuts. Whenever the minimum RH goes below the maximum temp, you know it's going to be a shit storm and today was off the scale.
ReplyDeleteBut I beg to differ when it comes to children. Having a child is an act of hope for the future, not against it. If we have a child we are forced to hold govs to account when it comes to our collective futures. These days, as a granny of an 8 year old, I'm asking super/banks/govts/corps to step up constantly.
DeleteWow. That relentless easterly that has been blowing for a couple of weeks must have dried everything out. That's scary.
DeleteThat's a different way of looking at it Sarah. I wish more people felt like you though. So many still seem oblivious of the threat to their grandkids. I can't believe your granddaughter is 8!!
DeletePretty freaky. Every green paddock is now brown within the last two or three days. It was the RH and wind speeds that did it.
DeleteI have spent a lifetime trying to figure out the difference between wanting to breed and just wanting to have sex. I think the desire to procreate should be a seriously conscious choice and decision, not just the result of a party night of too much booze and a whole lot of good vibes. I wish people would make conscious choices. Birth control is very good thing. The planet would be so happy.
ReplyDeleteI have often thought how clever Nature was in making sex and procreation so intertwined. It definitely ensures the survival of the species. I can appreciate people wanting to have children, but I agree with you - I wish they were more discerning about it and had less children. Maybe I'm just cynical because like many others I was an 'accident'. I suspect many people are accidents and that's not necesarily a bad thing either.
DeleteApparently, there are a lot of people choosing against having kids because of the state of the world. My own son wants just one because he expects one will be more than enough to take care of through catastrophic circumstances.
ReplyDeleteSydney is unseasonably cool which I'm loving and it doesn't give one that sense of impending apocalypse but it's probably just as bad.
I absolutely believe the planet can recover but we need to act right now
Yes I have heard that many younger people are assessing the risks and deciding not to have kids, or less of them. It's certainly easier to provide education if you have less. I can't generalise though - I've seen wonderful adults who were raised in big loving families, and they are definitely more integrated socially than I am. As always it probably comes down to the individual.
DeleteRe the climate: I agree it's easy to forget about global warming when you are having a good season. We've had a lot of rain this year and it has taken the stress off, but now that we are getting heat waves in the west, and the fire danger has ramped up, climate change is back on the agenda. I agree we have to act now and it's possible to turn this around but my current feeling is that we won't do it soon enough. I guess one scenario is that we warm th planet by a few degrees, which will have significant consequences, but that we stop before we wipe humanity off the globe entirely. Humans are adaptable so I'm confident there will be survivors, but I do think it will be hell on earth, and there will be a lot less people.