It’s early afternoon as I write this. I came up to the desk to make progress with a story, but woke up 45 minutes later, drowsy in the day’s warmth. In front of me I have a large glass containing ice, lime juice, ginger ale and crushed mint leaves. I’ve already had to rescue one wasp from it. Outside my window, a pair of juvenile goldfinches are at the birdfeeder.
Edinburgh often has days and weeks like this: warm under blue skies. For the past week or more I’ve been sleeping on top of the bed under – or not – a single blanket by an open window. My phone says it’s currently 24° outside, while, according to the thermometer behind my desk, it peaked at just short of 28° (81°F) here in the shed, with windows and doors open.
I can’t extrapolate from this, of course – it’s summer, after all, and my diary tells me that I can expect warmer later this month or in August. It hit 24° here a month ago as well. But neither can I ignore what is happening elsewhere in the world, all these ‘100 year’ events that seem to be happening every year, from excessive heat and fires on the west coast of North America, to the torrential downpours and floods in Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and Switzerland, to this year’s fires in Siberia and the melting Arctic. The most visible effect in Edinburgh has been milder, damper winters (see this post – second para. – from last October.)
Covid continues, and builds momentum, while politicians flounder in their own ineptitude, but it is the change in climate that’s the big picture, a process of change that I think is now irreversible. I keep up to date with news and views on climate change in the popular science press, and I know the view continues to be expressed that there’s still time to change course. But all the things that are said to be essential to do rely for their implementation on co-ordinated, decisive action by politicians and on the majority of humans ‘doing the right thing’.
The thing is, I have no faith that politicians in particular or humans in general will do anything at all of significance. Short of some volcanic cataclysm, the future is here and it’s already too late. The Moon is getting in on the act, too, sleekit wee bastard that it is.
What else is there to do but to sit here writing dystopian fiction?
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