Climate

As we enter our fifth day of clouds and rain in Boston, I am impressed with the effect of environment on mood, despite human preoccupations. The lack of sun takes its toll, whether recognized or ignored. More frequent yawns. An encroaching fatigue.

We look at earthquakes and volcanic eruptions as anomalies which invade our synthetic human safety. This estrangement from our real environment and place in it is itself toxic. If we allow our minds to kidnap our consciousness away from our basic animal needs and our place in the greater ecology, we pay dearly as individuals and as societies.

I am an animal, dependent on my environment for sustenance. Though I can jump in a polluting car to go to a supermarket to pay for food with artificial value (money) instead of my labor, I must maintain a present consciousness that this synthetic life is more fragile than Nature and at its mercy ultimately. 

Millions of human beings have never raised a plant from seed. Millions more are incapable of maintaining a plant, purchased from a supermarket or nursery. What is the inevitable fate of these human beings when their synthetic environment is destroyed by flood, earthquake or desertification?  The answer is painfully obvious.

As long as human beings worship imaginary protectors and money, instead of their own precious planet, human misery is guaranteed in ever-increasing quantities with overpopulation and diminished natural resources, like fresh water and clean air. Part of waking to a daily humanist practice is paying attention to the immediate environment. Maintaining my own personal environment in simple and concrete ways enhances my appreciation of the planet. Expending my own labor in this way leads me to appreciate the labor of farmers, engineers and others who work to maintain the planet and its precious resources, human and non-human.