Tide’s Coming In

So I hear that people are having mental and emotional problems under the pressure of isolation, plague illness, losing their jobs, losing their homes, losing their loved ones, seeing wildfires making the sky an impenetrable fug of smoke that we have been warned not to breathe - and now Ruth Bader Ginsburg has died.

Rest in peace, mighty warrior. Thank you for everything.

Now the inglorious leader has stated his unwillingness to give up the oval office if he loses the election. He has been saying this since 2017, but we are taking it seriously now.

This election and its outcome are a BIG DEAL, but this is not the time to despair and give up, dear hearts.

If you had any doubts before RBG passed, before you-know-who announced his intentions of being president for life, before Republicans broke a foaming sweat in their haste to get a conservative justice on the Supreme Court before the election, you know now that you need to step up to the plate. Our country, our whole world, our lives and the lives of our children and their children are at stake.

What can you do? For starters, VOTE in the coming presidential election. Vote and encourage others to vote, especially younger people. Vote. It might work.

Wear a mask. Do good deeds. Encourage the discouraged. Be kind.

Then there is the weather. Even those of us who embraced the science of climate change are surprised at how soon and how virulently changes have set in.

Many of us did not foresee all the hurricanes, tornadoes, wildfires, and temperatures up to 120 degrees Fahrenheit (49 degrees Celsius) in places in California where I used to live, fifty years ago.

This summer when the entire West Coast caught on fire, a plume of smoke that looked like a genie released from a lamp in satellite pictures moved up and over and around us. Suddenly we were in lockdown again, because of smoke. I started to feel like I was in solitary confinement, albeit a comfortable and plugged-in solitary confinement.

It is happening fast - the ice shelves and glaciers of Antarctica and Greenland are melting, and one article I read speculated that when all that water is released it could raise sea level ten feet.

Ten feet. I have been trying to imagine how that would play out on the island.

Probably the end of campfires at KVI.

The ferry docks would have to be moved or raised.

Would the Burton Peninsula become an island?

The debate about whether Vashon and Maury Islands are one or two islands will be over – two islands, dude, and how shall we get from one to the other when Portage is under water? Ferries? A bridge?

If Maury becomes an independent island, will someone re-open a market and post office there? Am I the only one who thought that closing those was a dumb idea?

I look down the ravine behind my house to where it opens into the Sound, and wonder, gee, if the sea level rises ten feet, how far up the ravine is the water going to come? If there is a tsunami, will it come up the ravine and all the way to the top of the bluff? You know, where I live?

Beach house owners – condolences.

Residents next to the Fauntleroy dock will no longer complain about the ferry traffic congestion, because their houses will be under water.

But I digress.

Many things we have had to do out of expediency during the pandemic have turned out to be positive changes that will stick around.

For example: telemedicine. How much easier is it to talk to a provider from home rather than drive/catch a bus to Seattle for an appointment that lasts fifteen minutes? Not to mention parking fees and ferry fare.

Online school gets mixed reviews. This is a challenge most parents, teachers, and students never expected to face. Those of us who homeschooled before computers and the internet feel your pain. A little.

Many people are saying, “I want to go back to the way it was before.” Yeah, me, too. Life was so much easier in so many ways before the weather became homicidal, before the pandemic hit, before the land caught fire, before we had a president who is certifiable, who unleashed the hounds of violent racist hell, who would like to see a renewed Civil War, and who is backed up by what is no longer the Republican party.

We took normal life for granted, didn’t we?

We know that we are never going back. We must adapt to climate change and Covid-19 and terrible politicians, see it through, and ride it out.

So, pray to God and row for shore.

And VOTE.