(I should begin this post with an aside that I went to happy hour with some work friends and tried a rum Old Fashioned. As it turns out, the drink (a) does not taste as good as a whiskey Old Fashioned but (b) has every bit as much alcohol. Apologies for going dark.)
I started running seriously back when we lived in Sacramento, just before my 30th birthday. I ran that first half marathon because I felt old and fat, which is exactly how you want to feel coming up on a milestone birthday. Now, 10 years later, I just haven’t kicked the running habit. On the cusp of another milestone birthday (and contemplating running my first full marathon), I’ve learned that, personally, I can run effectively from two places emotionally. The first is a place of inspiration, which occurs when I’m moved by the music coming through my earbuds, my legs feel great, and the day is beautiful. But, when I’m not feeling inspired but need to churn out the miles, I really have only one other option: get angry. While running from a place of anger isn’t ideal, it sure does work.
Today, as I listened to Diane Feinstein tell a bunch of kids lobbying her for a Green New Deal that they don’t know what they’re talking about and that she doesn’t technically represent them because they’re not voting age, I got angry. Feinstein’s attitude towards the kids and the very real threat they face in their lifetimes was cavalier at best, and it made me want to take my son and daughter to visit our congressmen and women every day. It’s not just that she condescends to a bunch of kids who are legitimately afraid for their futures, and who should at least expect some comfort that competent people are on the job. It’s that she is so much a product of a broken system, she believes that system should dictate how we respond to an existential crisis rather than the reverse. Others have spoken about this much more cogently on Pod Save America (the guest on that episode is also one of the main supporters of the Green New Deal) and in minute 44 of last week’s Meet the Press (by the way, I totally agree with Heather McGhee here and disagree with Andrea Mitchell).
As is so often the case, my anger comes in large part from a place of fear. Far and away the scariest book I’ve ever read was Collapse by Jared Diamond. Collectively, I think we all believe that, if our society gets close to the edge, we’ll legislate or innovate ourselves away from it. After all, look at all America has accomplished. But Diamond shows that history is littered with examples of societies that crashed into the wall at full speed. Even worse, collapse usually resulted when societies burned through their natural resources faster than anticipated. I’m not the first to draw parallels between the stories in Collapse and climate change. However, Feinstein’s reaction made me realize for the first time: in many societies that have fallen apart, there must have been citizens like us who watched it happen in slow motion, terrified about the future, knowing their leaders weren’t equipped to rise to the challenge.
Most of the time, I’m trying to raise awareness of climate change through persuasion, compassion, and dialog. Not tonight. Tonight I’m running angry.
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