So, I guess for­est fires are a thing for me now. I’ve expe­ri­enced thun­der­storms in North Car­oli­na, hur­ri­canes in Flori­da, earth­quakes (and ter­ror­ist attacks) in Man­hat­tan, dengue fever in Brazil…and now orange sky from fires burn­ing in Cana­da, Wash­ing­ton and Ore­gon. The amount of soot and debris that col­lect­ed on my vehi­cle left this first-timer amazed.

This is a no-fil­ter pho­to I took from my front yard with my aging iPhone 8. The Air Qual­i­ty Index was a mind-bog­gling 224, which trans­lates to “Very Unhealthy.” Because I’ve always been a “touch-the-stove-to-see-if-it’s-hot” kind of guy, I went out­side to breathe the neigh­bor­ly Cana­di­an ash. I can per­son­al­ly attest that it is indeed…very unhealthy.

With all the polit­i­cal smoke­screens in the news¹, it was almost refresh­ing to wit­ness an actu­al smoke­screen. I mean—not real­ly, but—well, you know. Regard­less of your pol­i­tics or the orange gra­di­ent of your intel­lect, it’s becom­ing hard to deny cli­mate change. Sor­ry, could­n’t help myself.

***

1. “Head­lines from the New York Times for Fri­day, Sep. 11, 2020.” The New York Times, www.nytimes.com/issue/todaysheadlines/2020/09/11/todays-headlines#politics. Accessed 12 Sep­tem­ber 2020. ↩︎