Turn the Heat Off
I hate being hot. I hate that it makes me lethargic. I hate that it tempts me to get an air conditioner, even though these convenient cooling machines only dig us further into our climate crisis. I hate that I have to battle with my husband — who loves nothing more than being warm and cozy — over whether to keep the window fan on while we sleep. And now that extreme heat events are almost certain to become more common during my lifetime, I hate the fact that there’s really no escaping them.
The Bay Area saw record heat just a few weeks ago, while Los Angeles had it even worse. This week, Seattle and Portland both saw jaw-dropping temperatures during what’s been described as the world’s most extreme heat wave in modern history. Canada’s British Colombia and Northwest Territories did too.
It’s not just the heat that I worry about, but what comes with it. The US Pacific Northwest and western Canada experienced an unprecedented number of heat-related deaths this past week. The small town of Lytton, Canada, burned to the ground soon after hitting 121 degrees Fahrenheit and destroying the national heat record. At least two people died. Fires are burning in California as well. If this year is anything like the last two, soon I may be breathing through an N-95 mask to filter out particulates whenever I venture outside, and contemplating where my family could move that would have less heat, less smoke, less destruction.
But as I stress over climate chaos, I've also had another thought that lies somewhere between hope and desperation: I wonder if we’ve finally reached the tipping point where rising temperatures are just too uncomfortable to ignore. I wonder if enough similarly heat-intolerant Californians, and Oregonians, and Washingtonians — and Coloradans and Mainers and so on — have suffered through enough “once-in-a-hundred-years” heat waves and tragic fire seasons that we are ready to come together to tackle the climate crisis once and for all.
Zoe Loftus-Farren
Managing Editor, Earth Island Journal
Photo by: Basti Voe
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