You Must Be The Change To See It

I've been left wondering what happened to the global warming discussion. Many others have as well. How is it that a topic that not five years ago seemed unstoppable, that we were finally going to get mandates for reducing carbon emissions enacted on a global scale, is today foundering in a rising ocean of distrust and failed cooperation?

Today it's not even referred to as global warming anymore; no, call it climate disruption, which is a "more appropriate" term to explain to those looking for answers in the aftermath of a dozen Alabama tornadoes.

What I believe, and indeed it's just a little opinion on a monologists web log, is that it failed because the representatives for the movement refused to adopt the low-energy alternatives they argued the rest of humanity had to follow. Understandably so -- I find myself arguing against the unsustainable lifestyle of suburbia while blogging comfortably from within its realm. I refuse to take meaningful actions regarding the profligate use of energy to support my suburban life...the only life I've ever known...

Yeah, I attached a couple of solar panels on the roof, and yeah, I bicycle to work 3-4 days a week. I've only partially adopted a less energy intensive living arrangement. I have no illusions about how I'm nowhere near a break-even energy lifestyle and I'd argue that the inertia of my existing way of life is still far too much to overcome.

I would argue, nonetheless, that to get on a bicycle and commute 88 miles a week is a step very, very few other Elk Grovians will ever take. The inertia of extreme auto dependency is just as powerful. It has become so powerful that Elk Grove mothers routinely forbid their children from walking and cycling to destinations that, when they were children themselves, were easily accessible via these modes, and instead are now shuttled about in three-ton Yukons for the sake of their children's safety.

To take that first stroke on the bicycle pedal is the hardest stroke to engage -- "you must be the change to see it," as Gandhi would have said. To mount a bicycle to commute to work is an active action, signalling a change to an entire lifetime of car dependency. But this is the one thing that we don't do, but it is the one thing that actually matters. This blind spot is what's plaguing the climate change movement and what's leading to riotous outcry over $4 (and someday, $5) gasoline.

I am taking baby steps, but they are important steps nonetheless. I simply cannot yet afford the high prices commanded by walkable, human scaled, transit oriented neighborhoods in Sacramento. Until I can, I'll continue to mount my 11-lb aluminum chariot, and I hope you wave to me as you drive by me on Franklin Boulevard.