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If I鈥檓 honest, I鈥檝e had a case of  of late. While huge strides have been made when it comes to energy transition, I fear we鈥檙e losing ground, . Some days I read a slew of articles about our rapidly decarbonizing planet. Other days I read a slew of articles about how our planet is not decarbonizing rapidly enough. Still other days, I exclusively read articles about how to bake vegan Minecraft cakes. And then ignore the instructions entirely. 

Tom Rand calls the climate crisis our . It sounds horrible. Like running an ultramarathon over and over again for all eternity, with a buttered watermelon on your back. But when you lean into it, you realize it鈥檚 the only way to describe what鈥檚 happening. Like the hip-hop injury I sustained while flexing overzealously in a class full of ladies half my age, climate is something I鈥檒l spend my life dealing with. The Mean Greens will come and go, just as my knee pains come and go. The key is to live with it, to keep pushing, and to keep practicing my cabbage patch.

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A few weeks ago, a younger colleague mentioned that many of her peers had already resolved themselves to the fact that the climate crisis will be their entire life effort. When I was her age, my biggest concern was whether I could go dancing all night and still make it to class in the morning. To reconcile yourself to the idea of the Forever Emergency at 22 is almost unfathomably brave. It鈥檚 also prescient. The world is all too slowly catching up to this century-long gambit, to the knowledge that we can mitigate, but that some things (ice shelves, various fauna, Scott Baio) are never coming back.

To all this you might say, holy hopelessness, Sarah, this is supposed to be a newsletter about climate positivity! And to this I say, accepting the truth of how we鈥檒l live with the climate crisis is actually very positive. Once you get around to the foreverness of the Forever Emergency, a lot of ambiguity goes away: You get a helpful framework for dealing with our current club sandwich of emergencies (climate is the plate). 

You get a framework for looking at things that is temporal as opposed to hierarchical鈥攚hich is important, given the infighting that can occur when people talk of current emergencies, stretched resources, and whether you can solve one issue (climate!) without solving another (inequality). Answer: no.

When you accept the foreverness of something you cease trying to squeeze it onto your daily to-do list. When you embrace the foreverness, you accept the full magnitude of our challenge, and contemplate what you can rearrange in your life to deal with it. This framing is incredibly empowering鈥攅very day, you are working towards something that will reduce the bad. 

What鈥檚 more, it all matters in the Forever landscape. The things you do and don鈥檛 do really do have long-term impact. Last week I listened to a seminar on hope with the amazing activist Tzeporah Berman called . She shared her life鈥檚 work. The timeline was overwhelming. Thirty years (and counting) spent hustling for climate. Pretty much… forever. Her takeaway: Every bit of carbon you save now鈥�saves lives. Or as the IPCC puts it: Every bit of warming matters, every year matters, every choice matters.

It can be tough to see the link between our carbon emissions and the sinking of Bangladesh, but it鈥檚 there. And it鈥檚 forever. I say this not to guilt myself for a life largely spent unaware of the excruciating toll my actions were taking on the world鈥檚 poor (not to mention my progeny), but to remind myself that everything I do is important NOW. In my younger years, I would lean into the melancholy of existence, in that drippy way that self-indulgent would-be artists do. I was deeply susceptible to the nefarious trope of the tortured artist. But my melancholy was conjured out of wine and heartbreak. The Forever Emergency is a real and lifelong heartache. Acknowledging this does not romanticize disaster, but instead subverts its power. We are, all of us, working our despair into action. Times infinity times infinity times infinity, as my son would say.

I WILL BE MORE CHEERFUL NEXT WEEK, Y鈥橝LL. (Yes, I鈥檓 allowed to say y鈥檃ll. I lived in the South. Once.) But for now, here are a few鈥�

BEAUTIFUL POSITIVE THINGS

https://twitter.com/ayanaeliza/status/1298622119195049985

The polling flips and flops when it comes to attitudes toward climate, . The belief in climate as a serious voting issue grows stronger by the day. I鈥檒l take it.

THIS WEEK

Does the Forever Emergency resonate with you? How do you process the timeline of a crisis? Let me know!

LAST WEEK

I love this recipe for a life well-lived from Paula:
I look for small actions. While working in the front yard, I offer tomato seedlings to families that walk by. Some take them, others think I am very strange. While in the back yard, I point to my compost bins and mention that building one is fairly easy and a good science project (as is growing food).

I point to my solar panels and victory garden and three water barrels and perhaps some will sink in.

I write letters to the editors of my local newspapers on combating climate change.

I email my friends who feel similarly when I am blue. I vent with my walking buddies as we enjoy the beautiful parks and trails.

I have an estate plan that includes contributions to environmental organizations. I make regular contributions now to many environmental and social justice groups (they often overlap).

I carry petitions or send opportunities for people to speak out on changes in policy鈥攅specially in the current administration. I ask that they send them on to others who may want to participate.

I used to do more in-person things. Go to rallies, meetings, marches, press conferences and protests and I will do so again when it is safe to gather together.

And I read widely on environmental and economic issues. And read the comics and see silly movies at home and pet my two shelter cats and hug my husband a lot.

And other things, too. But I can鈥檛 remember all of them as I have done this a very long time.

PEOPLE DANCING

https://www.tiktok.com/@dharmesh_0022/video/6803699656703446274?lang=en

Hope you are healthy and happy and forever grateful to be a human alive right now,
Sarah

SHOP TALK

My amazing friend  writes a great newsletter called At The End Of The Day. Read this lovely entry in which . Adorable much?

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P.S. Like this newsletter? Tell a friend?
P.P.S. As always, tell me how I can make it better!
P.P.P.S. Sometimes I draw comics about non-climatey things, like the state of public education. ! If you鈥檙e newly subscribed to this newsletter because of , thanks and welcome!!

P.P.P.P.S. This is my newsletter for the week of August 27, 2020, published in partnership with 猫咪社区! Media. You can sign up to get Minimum Viable Planet newsletter emailed directly to you at .