[guest column. Lorne’s long-anticipated book Streams of Consequence will be released in fall 2023 by Rocky Mountain Books. More info: https://rmbooks.com/book/streams-of-consequence/ ]
Lorne Fitch, P. Biol.
Against white cumulus clouds roiling in a slow boil, a redtail hawk soared on a rising wind. Never once flapping its wings, but dipping and weaving with the gusty winds it tacked forward. A weather front, with inky blue/black clouds rolled in ˚˚from the north on a chilly wind. The plus 30˚ C air was shoved aside, to my relief. I could both feel and taste the cooler air of the front as it passed over the cabin. A sudden drop in temperature and the quality of the air seemed fresher, energized. The hawk, inexplicably pursued by a flock of waxwings, disappeared into the gloom of the approaching front.
From sweating to shivering in minutes, like a fridge door opening. Under a roof the spectacle is partly pure entertainment. But with the drought-parched grass, tinder dry, waiting for some casually tossed cigarette butt, a hot exhaust from an off-highway vehicle or a lightning stab, there is also a palpable sense of anxiety.
To hell with BBQs, town parades and golf games—let it rain, rain hard, rain long, soak the earth. Except, with the wind is a little fragment of ash, from nowhere close I hope. Probably lofted on the winds from fires in BC. Anxiety escalates—climate or eco-anxiety. The American Psychological Association has defined this as “a chronic fear of environmental doom.”
The weather system huffed and puffed, sending chairs flying. Dark clouds, so full of promise, delivered a few sprinkles. This hardly registered in the dust. It’s enough to persuade you to wash the car, hang out clothes on the line or take a hike without your rain coat. Anything to tempt the rain gods.
But I think, if it rains too hard, forests ravaged by clearcut logging can’t hold the rain. Then somebody’s basement is going to get wet, or a bridge will get washed out. Receiving streams and rivers can’t hold it all. Stream banks get eroded, the channels widen and when water levels go down, they go way down so the water is shallow. Then the water warms up too quickly and native trout suffer. Trout have suffered enough, so much so they are missing in many of their old haunts. This makes me sad.
What makes me even sadder is we can’t seem to come to grips with connecting the dots, especially limits. The ever expanding footprint of logging, of roads and off-highway vehicle trails that dissect the landscape, of cultivation of native grassland, of draining our rivers for irrigation, of oil and gas extraction, and of urban sprawl. I could go on but this puts me on the edge of either crying or raging. The rampant greed, thoughtlessness, destruction and inability to think ahead for other generations mystifies, frustrates and angers me.
It seems the places most in peril are the ones of great natural beauty, biodiversity havens and ones ecologically intact. Once we put them through the development shredder they are rendered barely recognizable, like an old friend ravaged by disease.
Because I am old enough to remember intact places and have listened to those older than me wax on about fish and game abundance I can see the extent of changes, of losses, of damage. Acid drips on my soul. Even when I find out there is a name for this feeling of homesickness for something that no longer exists—solastalgia—it doesn’t modify my eco-grief. It does help that others have experienced this deep feeling of grief for our landscapes, plants and wildlife.
Routinely, when destructive development threatens an intact landscape, we ask for the rationale and press for environmental impact assessments. To further prevent these losses we have lobbied for better land use planning, cumulative effects assessments, the setting of ecological thresholds and timely, progressive reclamation standards. But we end up fighting rear guard actions, over and over. It’s draining and it adds to the sense the cards are stacked against a reasonable, rational, ecological approach.
The Mental Health Commission of Canada summarizes these feelings with, “The natural environment is changing, and people are worried about what it means for the future. That worry, which is increasingly becoming severe enough to cause distress and dysfunction.”
Even though 75 per cent of people living in Canada consider climate change a global emergency there is a combination of denial (most notably among some federal and provincial politicians) and the fatalistic thought it’s too late to do anything about it. The problem with deniers and their kin in the corporate and political world is summarized in Dornbusch’s Law, which states, “Crises take longer to arrive than can be imagined, but when they do come, they happen faster than possibly can be imagined.” How many “wake up” calls do we need?
I know I harbour anger and a level of frustration toward governments that have not done enough (or anything) to curb the tsunami of climate change, manifested in catastrophic wildfires, floods and drought. Equally so I feel the anger directed at older generations, like mine, for misusing the time and influence to alter the trajectory we are now on.
This also leads me to a combination of guilt and further anger over our individual carbon footprints. Our economy, our policies, advertising and perhaps our psyches are geared to consumption. This exceeds the Earth’s ability to supply the raw materials and deal with the environmental costs of production, transportation and waste disposal. We desperately need some full cost accounting to show us a possible way out of this overextension of the global natural bank account.
Alan Moore, in the Watchmen, said in what could be a response to eco-anxiety, “In an era of stress and anxiety, when the present seems unstable and the future unlikely, the natural response is to retreat and withdraw from reality, taking recourse either in fantasies of the future or in modified visions of a half-imagined past.” Sound familiar, in observations of how some react?
Short of some kind of technological and unlikely miracle, there isn’t a quick cure for our environmental muddle, especially the climate change one. While it’s true the corporate and political world have a lot to be answerable for, that tends to absolve us as individuals of responsibility. Each of us has to acknowledge a level of responsibility and step up to the plate with solutions within our sphere.
I acknowledge my role in our environmental pickle. Yes, I live in a house made of wood, drive an internal combustion engine car and eat bananas flown in from Ecuador. That is a first step for all of us to take. I rely on acknowledged experts to inform my thinking on topics of an environmental nature and then use my writing to inform others. Without reliance on science and critical thinking it is easy to fall down the rabbit holes of conspiracy theorists, denialists, false experts, misinformation and distortion.
Part of our angst is we have little control over most external circumstances. We can choose how to respond though. Each of us can take actions and have control of some aspect that can reduce eco-anxiety, maybe even grief. In Sing You Home, author Jodi Picoult writes, “Anxiety’s like a rocking chair. It gives you something to do, but it doesn’t get you very far.”
If we have investments we have the choice of where to invest, refusing to put our money into things that continue to pollute, eat up our landscape and exacerbate climate change. We can live more simply and sustainably by resisting the urge (and advertising) to be bigger consumers. Since the energy cost of transporting food far outweighs the energy in it, we can eat closer to home, by patronizing local food growers, especially the ones involved in regenerative agriculture. When we vote we should think several generations ahead, not what fills our pockets today.
When I think of growing up in the 1950s and 60s, we didn’t have much, didn’t seem to miss it and I don’t think I was emotionally scarred by not having the latest toy or nice clothing or exotic travel. I’m reminded of the tongue in cheek statement that, “No one is going to stand up at your funeral and say, ‘he drove a really nice car and had expensive golf clubs.’ Don’t make life about stuff.”
I strive to reduce my footprint, albeit sometimes unsuccessfully. Changing our lifestyles and overly consumptive habits isn’t about perfection but being aware of not only the price sticker, but also the environmental cost of our activities and purchases. Then it’s working towards a goal of reducing our footprint as well as feelings of guilt and anxiety about our future. Collectively that can make a difference. Then the only thing left is to pressure government and the corporate world to do their part.
August 2023
Lorne Fitch is a Professional Biologist, a retired Fish and Wildlife Biologist and a former Adjunct Professor with the University of Calgary.
Kevin Van Tighem 