"Dust In The Wind"
I close my eyes only for a moment, and the moment's gone
All my dreams pass before my eyes, a curiosity
Dust in the wind, all they are is dust in the wind
Same old song, just a drop of water in an endless sea
All we do crumbles to the ground, though we refuse to see
Dust in the wind, all we are is dust in the wind
Now, don't hang on, nothing lasts forever but the earth and sky
It slips away, and all your money won't another minute buy
Dust in the wind, all we are is dust in the wind (all we are is dust in the wind)
Dust in the wind (everything is dust in the wind), everything is dust in the wind (the wind)
Dust in the Wind by Kansas is a significant song for me. My wife and I grew up in Kansas City and we used to see them play at a local pub back in the 70's before they were famous.
We just celebrated our 37th wedding anniversary on July 30th. It has been a wonderful ride. I think we have a special relationship. We care about each other a lot. But the time sure has gone fast.
I can't imagine life without her. She means the world to me. It scares me to think of her passing before me. It's really hard to think about.
The song she wants played at her memorial service is Dust in the Wind. Every time I hear this song I think of the possibility of having to hear that song without her.
I try to maintain a stoic frame of mind when contemplating all this. I know the life we share will one day come to an end. I know our love for each other matters only to us. They are our shared memories and when we are both gone they will be like dust in the wind.
I try to maintain a stoic attitude when contemplating climate change too. I know humans have love for their lives here on Earth. We've had a hell of a ride. We think we've got a special relationship with Earth. We profess to care about the health of the Earth a lot. But the time sure is going fast.
I can't imagine life without a healthy Earth. It means the world to me. It scares me to think of the current state of the Earth's health. It's really hard to think about.
But just like I think about the possibility of having to face that fateful day when I will have to listen to Dust in the Wind without my wife by my side, I think about climate change and what life will be like without a healthy Earth in which to live.
Follow below the orange hairpiece to think about it with me. Time is Wasting.
The
Northern Hemisphere’s ‘dust belt’ extends from North Africa, through the Arabian Peninsula, to southern and central Asia. As you can see from the above map, Iran is in this 'dust belt'.
In early June Iran experienced a serious dust storm. It caused chaos across the country. A wall of dust enveloped the country blown by winds of at least 110kph.
Dust storms have always been a regular occurrence in Iran but there is evidence that they are happening much more frequently. In 2013, 23 of the country’s 31 provinces were affected by dust storms. Tehran experienced dust clouds on 117 days.These storms are a natural result of weather patterns, reaching a peak during the spring and summer months as temperatures rise and rainfall reaches a minimum. However, there is evidence that their frequency has increased as a result of changes in land and water use and also climate change.
Between 2000 and 2009 the frequency of dust storms increased by 70 to 170% in the western provinces, when compared with the preceding 30 years. This increase coincided with a general fall in rainfall and a significant increase in average temperatures.
Iranian scientists have predicted Iran is facing a 2 degree C increase in temperature in the next 25 years and a 9 percent drop in precipitation.
OK, so that is modern day Iran. But take a look back at our history.
U.S. Dust Bowl - 1930's
The Dust Bowl, also known as the Dirty Thirties, was a period of severe dust storms that greatly damaged the ecology and agriculture of the US and Canadian prairies during the 1930s; severe drought and a failure to apply dryland farming methods to prevent wind erosion (the Aeolian processes) caused the phenomenon. The drought came in three waves, 1934, 1936, and 1939–40, but some regions of the High Plains experienced drought conditions for as many as eight years.
Could this happen again?
A look at the U.S. drought monitor as of the end of July.
As of July 29, 2014
Nick Wiltgen, digital meterologist for weather.com says,
Under the right circumstances, say the Ogallala Aquifer gets overdrawn or climate change reduces snowmelt for the Platte and Arkansas rivers and farming halts in the High Plains, it could happen. However, he adds, it would be on a radically smaller scale.
But when I look at the map I don't feel confident about it being "on a radically smaller scale. I get the opposite feeling.
Also, when I read the latest headlines I don't get the feeling it will be "on a radically smaller scale" either.
From the LA Times July 31, 2014
More than half of California is now under the most severe level of drought for the first time since the federal government began issuing regular drought reports in the late 1990s, according to new data released Thursday.
Unfortunately, it looks like things are only going to get worse.
It's possible that all of the American southwest could soon be seeing the devastating drought conditions that are being seen in California.
That's because the largest surge of heat ever recorded moving west to east in the Pacific Ocean, often referred to as a Kelvin Wave, which was supposed to start an El Niño and bring tropical-like rains to the West Coast and southwest, just dissipated, after it was absorbed by abnormally warm ocean waters.
When it doesn't fall in the form of rain people resort to getting their water from the ground.
New satellite data from NASA shows the West (mostly Southwest) has been sucking underground water resources out at an alarming rate.
In a recently released study
by NASA and University of California, Irvine, scientists find more than 75 percent of the water loss in the drought-stricken Colorado River Basin since late 2004 came from underground resources. The extent of groundwater loss may pose a greater threat to the water supply of the western United States than previously thought. …
“We don’t know exactly how much groundwater we have left, so we don’t know when we’re going to run out,” said Stephanie Castle, a water resources specialist at the University of California, Irvine, and the study’s lead author. “This is a lot of water to lose. We thought that the picture could be pretty bad, but this was shocking.”
This report comes on the heels of the hottest June for oceans since record keeping began in 1880.
Also, there has been increasing worry over the state of the Ogaliala Aquifer. It "waters 27 percent of the nation's irrigated cropland.
From National Geographic:
Decades of heavy pumping have caused widespread depletion of the Ogallala in its southernmost reaches, which get very little recharge from current rainfall. Since 1940, a volume of groundwater equivalent to two-thirds of the water held in Lake Erie has been depleted from the Ogallala,
An finally from
The New York Times:
Droughts appear to be intensifying over much of the West and Southwest as a result of global warming. Over the past decade, droughts in some regions have rivaled the epic dry spells of the 1930s and 1950s. About 34 percent of the contiguous United States was in at least a moderate drought as of July 22.
The Earth doesn't care about us. We care about us. As far as the Earth is concerned we are just
Dust in the Wind. It would behove all of us to think about this.
Time is Wasting.
The Church of the Holy Shitters will post articles on our holy S.H.I.T. day ( So Happy It's Thursday)
Last week: 8/7/14 - Pop a Poop Pill
Next week: 8/21/14 - Sanitation - Food for Thought
Hoping to add some humor, provoke thought, spark debate, deepen understanding, and shed some light on the fecal side.
Remember: "If we really want to straighten out all this crap we really need to think about shit." ( Shitbit by Poop John the First of the Church of the Holy Shitters)
Church of the Holy Shitters
A secular environmental religion, scientifically based, with a focus on the psychology of it all. Our ego is the culprit when it comes to dealing with climate change. We cannot save the planet. We can only save ourselves. Our current egotistical self-perception makes that prospect a dubious one at best. Meekness, humility and a realization that our shit does stink, guides us on our path to true sustainable living and climate equilibrium.
Cross posted at http://holyshitters.com/