There is climate news everyday, something that was never part of my life as kid. Today, it is matter of fact and I am not confusing it with being a normal state of affairs either. Earlier this week, Australia made the news, because its average daily temperature exceeded 106 degrees. Any of us would be dead with a reading like that. I thought about the earth being sick, just like any of us. When we are not feeling well, we go to the doctor. Where does our planet go for help and the answer is us.
My analogy lost its traction instantly, because while this planet and its human inhabitants are inseparable, our fates are not. Our lives couldn’t be more different. The cosmic birth of this place is still a mystery of sorts, with the Big Bang Theory being the most popular. No, I am not going whip out Wikipedia to regurgitate the details and appear far brighter than I am. I know it’s got something to do with a wicked case of gas, farting itself into existence, along with a whole bunch of other similarly compressed bubbles, each one uniquely different. My main point here is that earth has a history that rivals God’s and there will likely be an endless debate about who was here first.
Let’s get back down to earth. I hope you don’t mind, but I am going to use the feminine as the pronoun to identify her. I feel it’s appropriate, because she has been the hostess for everything that has occurred, both under her skin and on it. When she was ready, after going through an infinite number of cosmetic surgeries over time, before there was even time, life happened. We will likely continue to drive ourselves mad about the origins of this miraculous accident, along with the entire creation business, attempting to wring out precision, answering the question that will make sense of Everything, a cure for the unknowable.
When she was finally ready, Earth was joined by Air, Fire and Water. In some, too perfect combination, these elements came together in a symphony of silent witness. She has been an unbelievably gracious host, since the first cell or virus or bacteria, or who the hell knows what, creating life beyond her own. After all this time, in her indescribable magnificence, she has a deadly fever, but it will not kill her.
We have polluted the life giving elements that gave birth to us. Exposure to toxic air, water, soil and chemical pollution is now killing over 8 million people each year. Our country falls within the top 10 in this ignominious measurement. While there is plenty of talk regarding rising seas, 2/3 of the world’s population will be desperate for water for drinking and agriculture in a fistful of years.
Before you and I got here, I don’t know how many living creatures came and went. They were nameless and likely not all that bright. Fortunately, there were no mirrors back then, because they probably would have scared themselves to death, even before she had a chance to undo them. The progression of life has been incredible, with some ancient survivors still around for well over a million years, like turtles, sharks and alligators.
I think it was thinking that was the game changer. Everything was going along rather smoothly, which doesn’t mean it was without challenges either. Bigger things ate smaller things and basic stupidity was likely quite problematic. In a way, life before thinking was kind of victimized by circumstance beyond its control. For instance, it got real cold a very long time ago and it didn’t work out too well for the naked and homeless. I think a couple of meteors whacked us pretty bad and talk about an ensuing mess?
Over time and after a bunch of false starts, we have grown pretty damn smart. We focus a lot of our energy on curing a wide variety of maladies, many of them caused by us, but we don’t like to talk about it. We’re proud of increasing our longevity, too. Then, at the same time, we don’t seem to be paying attention to the suffering, caused by our own hand. Those clods that came before us, many with too many X’s in their names, were all about surviving and it was some pretty basic stuff. The bigger ones probably kept an extra helping or two of their version of PB&J, but, because they couldn’t count, it likely wasn’t all that much. We invented greed, a lousy cure for shitty self-worth. We have punished each other as a result and abused our home.
For a species that is relatively new and pretty damn smart, why aren’t we taking care of our very sick planet? Here’s the thing, we are the ones on her death bed, because this is just another change for her. I can guarantee you Mother Earth has run fevers well in excess of 106 degrees and she has flooded and burned and emitted some deadly farts before now and She has never needed a doctor.
We are the ones, who need medical attention, not to take care of her, but to take care of each other. She’ll be fine.