Climate change is real. Here in Saint Louis, over the last twenty years, three-quarters of our summers have been wetter than usual. This summer is no exception. We’ve had rain almost every day this week. It is all that warmer and wetter Gulf air that is being swept up north to us that is causing this climate change. We dodged Ida, but I asked the boys if they were affected at all by it. In Boston, Dave and Maren “evacuated” before the storm arrived. This holiday weekend is a double wedding weekend for them. One is in upstate New York, while the other is in Indiana. In NYC, Dan and Britt were not so lucky. At five flights up, I didn’t think that flooding was much of a concern. He said that they had a roof leak, manageable but annoying, but Britt’s folk’s place in Queens got flooded. They got like a good 8-10″ of water in their basement’s low spot. In Britt’s studio at their house, it was closer to 1-2″. A lot of her stuff was safe by virtue of being on shelves, but definitely a few things were ruined.

So, while the Eastern US is drowning, the West is bone dry and is burning up. Last year, my Dad and brother Chris in Monterey had to evacuate for real, because a fire was approaching. Fortunately, that fire was stopped and after a harrowing day, they could go back home again. This year, it is my other brother Frank and his wife Kathy who are being troubled by fire. In particular the Caldor fire that is in the news. This fire started about halfway between their house in foothills of central California and their lodge at Lake Tahoe. We drove through the area of the Caldor fire earlier this summer, when we drove up to Tahoe. It is a very rugged and mountainous land. The wind has been blowing the fire away from their house, but towards their new lodge in Tahoe, which is located about halfway up the lake on the California side. They got an evacuation order for their lodge, but they were not there. The Caldor fire is still uncontained and likely won’t be put out for months. Such is the new normal of climate change.