Climate Change Is Me

Why this has become my niche

I’m as close as it comes to being a climate change reporter without actually being one.

More often than not, other Medium writers suggest that one should stick with writing about, or in, one niche.

I picked a doozy.

Formerly, I wrote in nine, count ’em, nine — subject areas. I’ll probably still drop a story here and there in areas I plan on eliminating. But these are the categories that I’ll focus on moving forward:

* PRIMARY: Climate Change/Megadrought in the Southwest * SECONDARY: Music/Pop Culture * SECONDARY: LGBTQ/Gay Culture

The two secondaries are areas where I’m already entrenched and have received top writer nods twice in both categories. As such, I think I have something of value to offer to my readers.

My primary is more of a challenge.

Most of my knowledge of climate comes from Meteorology 101 in college and in taking an above-average interest in it avocationally.

Weather makes sense to me. It’s cause and effect. Most people are interested in the weather, so there’s a built-in readership for the subject matter.

What makes it challenging is the sheer magnitude of the issue and the amount of information to sort through.

Every day I scan two or three news sources and select the details I find most pertinent to the story that needs to be reported. It is fascinating but very time-consuming. And my focus is just a tiny part of this complex issue.

But you know what really gets to me?

The sheer magnitude of it. Everything is affected.

It often leaves me exhausted, worried, and sad at the same time.

And there’s not a damn thing I can do about it. The damage has been done. I’m just describing the fallout.

The fact that I live at Ground Zero of climate change is another reason why I write about it. I’ve only lived in New Mexico for four years, but I’ve been coming here most of my adult life. The state’s tagline really got me. It truly is enchanting here.

Being a gardener, I see climate change every day. Even with amending the sandy soil, and using dead leaves as a canopy, most of the flowers I’m attempting to grow are drooping by mid-afternoon. I’ll have to switch to all native plants next year, as I’m sure watering restrictions will be put into place any day now. But, of course, I shouldn’t be watering every day anyway.

The spring winds were unusually strong this year, and combined with the powerful sun at this altitude, they squeezed every bit of moisture out of the ground and the vegetation. As a result, the state’s first and second biggest wildfires in history are burning as I write this.

Our only true hope out of this inferno is a strong monsoon season and many successive years of normal to above-normal amounts of precipitation. However, with a strong La Niña in place, which increases the temperature and reduces the precipitation that the Southwest receives, there is little hope of that occurring.

Smokey Bear was “born” here. He would be weeping today.

Climate change was first referred to as global warming, and rightly so. Global warming started with the Industrial Age, resulting in climate change. Current worldwide efforts are to keep the earth’s warming below an increase of 1.5°C. Anything above that can cause accelerated melting of the West Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets. And by now, we all know what can happen if that is allowed to occur. Unfortunately, at this moment, as a collective, we are behind the eight ball.

I was wrong when I said above that there was nothing I could do about it. We can all do our small parts and achieve small results. (In some cases, we’ll be forced to.)

Most of the water we use is dedicated to agricultural purposes, and they bear the brunt of the shortfall.

But regarding global warming, the lion’s share of the burden rests with the world’s governments, and the corporations that are spewing greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. It is a herculean task.

Have you noticed a change in the weather patterns where you live? It can take decades to establish a pattern, but it’s only taken 22 years for the current megadrought to wreak havoc on the West and Southwest. That is within almost most people’s lifetimes.

I encourage you to observe the changing weather patterns where you live and see how you are affected.

Is the world’s will strong enough to keep global warming, and thus climate change at bay? It won’t be long before we know.

Here are a couple of my first stories on climate change:

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