A Future We Choose

Speaking of believing in the future, the United Nations Environment Programme has just released an updated "Global Environment Outlook," subtitled A Future We Choose. These reports are the fruit of a magnificent on-going act of scientific collaboration. Hundreds of scientists from a plethora of disciplines and countries have worked across the decades to produce a single point of view which they summarize as follows:

The report finds that investing in a stable climate, healthy nature and land, and a pollution-free planet can deliver trillions of dollars each year in additional global GDP, avoid millions of deaths, and lift hundreds of millions of people out of hunger and poverty in the coming decades.

Following current development pathways will bring catastrophic climate change, devastation to nature and biodiversity, debilitating land degradation and desertification, and lingering deadly pollution – all at a huge cost to people, planet and economies.

So there you have it: prosperity or catastrophe. The evidence has never been clearer, the costs are increasing by the day, and the solutions are well understood and are known to be economically and technically entirely feasible. Global surveys show that, no duh, people prefer prosperity And yet, as best I can tell, this report, the seventh and best of its kind, has received even less notice than any of its predecessors, a direct result of the dismantling of the US government's sensory organs and of the general stifling of environmental discourse that is being driven by the maimed parts of that government still in operation. Of all its many, many crimes, this is the Administration's worst and the one for which we will all pay the most and the longest. I saw this coming a long way off but watching it happen is horrifying beyond what I ever imagined.

Day 7499

My wedding ring fell apart a few days ago. A portent? No, but certainly a reminder that my marriage, like the artifact that symbolizes it, could use some care and attention. Nor is it the only such: the day counter stopped working some time back and was put in the project pile where, now that I think of it, Talia's engagement ring has been languishing for years and years. Well here's one thing fixed, anyway:

The days go on

I don't propose to fix my wedding ring myself but will instead take it back to the goldsmith who made it when next I visit Amsterdam. In the meanwhile it's still wearable and, in its shaky state, serves as a constant and welcome reminder to show more love to my sweet wife. 

Happy day 7500, Talia. You are better and more true than gold.

Happy Birthday, Nurit (aka "The Long Play")

Aren't you excited to have another birthday?

Talia has a special skill: compliment her on an item in the house or a piece of clothing she is wearing and she will immediately tell you who gifted it or in what shop, online or off, it was purchased, and when. I, lacking memories not written out in this blog, am wowed every time she does this trick. I suspect this skill is inherited because Talia's mother, Nurit, can likewise detail the provenance of her possessions. Further, she builds on this to do something even more impressive: she produces objects--critical artifacts for ceremonies, gifts purchased decades ago, the right tool for the job--exactly when they are most appropriate or needed. This implies that she not only knows where things come from but also where they are and, in some cases, that she first acquired them with this eventual use in mind.

There is a lot to like about my mother-in-law but I particularly admire this ability to produce a carefully stored item at the moment it is most needed. It demands organizational skill, careful planning, and, most special, the ability to imagine yourself at a specific juncture in the far future which, I assert, is a rare act of imagination: yes, we all think about the future and some of us even make plans, but most of us don't really believe in a time that is not now but is then.

Nurit does and so do I, but unlike Nurit there's not a chance I will remember where I buried a time capsule without written instructions, so, note to self: if you are looking for books and toys for eventual grandchildren they are in the eaves of the barn, the pictures of the framing of our rebuilt house before the drywall went up are in the folder labeled--wait for it...--"Behind the drywall at 10 Court," and the ketubah is, hmmm, well somewhere in the archive I'm sure.