"I, of the Storm . . . "

I spent Labor Day weekend waiting out a storm on my brother in law’s boat. My wife and I got into a big fight that I'd rather not relive right now and I just needed a place to stay, a little shelter from our storm.  I could have gone out to the bars, visited a strip club or just gotten a lonely hotel room somewhere and stewed.  Instead I stowed myself away on the boat, read the news on my phone compulsively and watched Antenna TV:  “The Mod Squad,” “Red Dawn,” “Maude,” “Archie Bunker.”  Those were the days . . .

Texas is drying out from the strongest hurricane to hit the state in recorded history. We were in Texas just over a month ago.  Dallas. The city was unaffected, but the convention center where Jenny spent three days became a shelter for two thousand Houstonians escaping the rising water to the south.  Meanwhile tho

usands of miles away there was another hurricane eying up Florida.  All this even as my floating hotel rocked gently against the dock.  

Earlier this summer we visited Glacier Park in Montana. It was in the news too. The problem there wasn't water it was fire.   Thousands of acres of forest on fire. A 100-year old national park lodge burned to the ground. The Sperry Chalet was only accessible on horseback or on foot. We’ll never even get a chance to see it.  Gone.  We drove past the historic McDonald Lake Lodge, but the parking lot was packed so we drove on. Had we known how close the fire was going to come, or that the land around it was likely to be scarred for a century, maybe we would have at least looped back around for a look.  

If you've ever spent much time on the water you know there's a reason behind the old cliche “don't rock the boat”.  Even after 3 days and nights of relatively calm water I developed a queasiness that lasted through midweek.  Of course the leftover pizza and diet cream soda probably didn't help.

I asked myself if the severe storms down south and  the fires in Oregon, California and Montana might finally convince people that things ain’t normal.  I’ll be the first to admit that I’m not a scientist and that I don’t understand the complexities of climate change.  But am I the only one who thinks  it's odd that the person who claims global climate change is a hoax perpetrated by the Chinese is sharing his opinion using satellites and a cell phone?  Neither of those technological wonders would exist without the same systematic process that climate scientists use to explain their conclusions.

In order for it to be a hoax scientists studying ice cores in Antarctica would have to be conspiring with oceanographers in Australia,  climate scientists in Brazil,  etc. In order to deny it you have to believe in a grand conspiracy involving every scientific discipline with an -ology at the end of its name and some that don't. The fact that you don't understand something doesn't mean it isn't true.

We can debate the impact humans are having on climate and what we should do about it.  But within the scientific community there isn't much debate.  There’s broad consensus across scientific disciplines.  Politicians can debate what if anything we should do about the problem but if they have questions about climate change all they have to do is ask the scientists.

The storm back home passed as storms do - a little clean up and mending of fences and everything was back to abnormal.  We got lucky here in Wisconsin this year. We're too far north to worry about hurricanes and forest fire season is just about over. But winter is coming...