Kneeling on the bricks in our town square, my older son seemed to be attacking them with chalk. Intently focused, he was rubbing his blue piece of chalk onto a brick.
“I’m rage-chalking,” he informed me.
“Ah,” I said, now understanding. “Yes, that’s absolutely something you can do.” I nodded and went back to filling in my own squares.
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Endless hurricanes, wildfires, and flooding; astronomically high prices and low wages; biodiversity collapse – is this the future you expect for your kids in 30 years? For many of us concerned about climate change and social inequality, it seems like the future is going to be pretty grim. Some people are even going so far to think we’re going to be living in something out of a dystopia SF novel (if we’re not already).
But while being prepared for a legit natural or human-caused disaster is a good thing, hunkering down in despair isn’t. Honestly, our children deserve for us to at least try to turn this ship in the right direction. No one wants to tell their kids, “We didn’t bother trying because what was the point?”
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I didn’t expect to think of the Fraggles when reading about Indigenous perspectives on the environment, but that’s just how my brain works. Despite the weird connection, it gave me a new perspective on how I can treat holiday gifts and in fact, our whole community in the year to come.
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“You’re so brave,” said a woman on the sidewalk as I pedaled by her slowly. Her words came right on the heels of me tearing into my older son about not screwing around while biking in the road. (He was riding so slowly I was almost crashing into him and swerving.) “Uh, thanks?” I stammered, not sure what else to say.
While I didn’t have much to respond in the moment, the comment stuck with me. Brave? What did she mean by that?
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Are you a tired person? (Probably – if you’re reading my blog, you’re probably a parent or somehow responsible for small kids.) Do you want to take action on climate change? (Even if you don’t, you should!) If both of these things – or neither – apply to you, be sure to check out the Climate Action for Tired People: A Toolkit and Quiz for Parents and Others! Developed by climate communicator and therapist Kate Schapira in collaboration with me, it helps you figure out where you fit in the climate justice movement and how to use your skills effectively.
“Shhh, be quiet, she’s trying to do work,” a mom said to her preschooler, a few feet away from me. I glanced up from my laptop and winced, realizing I was the “she” the mom was referring to.
I sighed. I didn’t want to undermine her, but neither did I actually want her kid to be quiet. Quite the opposite, in fact.
Parents are supposed to keep their kids safe, right? But how can we do that when the world around us is falling apart? There’s escalating climate change, COVID getting ever more contagious, civil rights eroding constantly, gun violence heightening, and democracy in danger. Not to mention the less privileged of us who have more individual, very real worries about their children’s everyday safety.
Some people retreat to denial, pretending nothing’s wrong at all and they play no part. Others – far more dangerously – blame vulnerable groups for “corrupting” children, when they are the corrupting ones instilling hate and fear.
Then there’s those of us who know what’s happening and don’t know what to do about it. I include myself in this group because as much as I intellectually know what to do about it, emotionally I still feel befuddled much of the time.
I started writing this from the balcony of a hotel while I was isolating from my kids because I tested positive for COVID. I worked so hard for more than two years to avoid it and the moment we went on vacation, got it. What else could I have done? I have no idea. There’s no way we could have expected this would still be going this long and be even more contagious when we planned this trip a year ago. That was when it was at all-time lows!
While emotionally I’m flailing, intellectually I do know some things that can help.
Under the little girl’s steady hand before me, I saw a world emerging. A world that’s more environmentally and socially sustainable, powered by solar panels and windmills, with lots of ways to get around besides cars. All laid out there in marker.
This was just one of many amazing examples I got when I asked kids to envision their ideal city. I did two different book promotion events – one at a spring festival at our local nature center and one at a book festival – and had this visioning activity to engage kids walking by. (It’s the activity in the last chapter of my book!)
“After a while, are they just sick of it? Are they just like, ‘Not another climate march!’?” an interviewer asked me on a podcast about my book.
That question came back to me on Bike to School Day, after we had stood in the drizzly rain that morning.
Two small heads, one brown-haired, one baby-blond turning brown. Both buried in books, racking up minutes for their school’s Read-A-Thon. Two bodies, snuggled on the couch, not arguing or bouncing. A rare moment where they’re both still.
I blink.
Images of crying parents and classmates next to a brick wall. Outside of an elementary school. Police tape and sirens. News headlines.
My breath catches.