Wist must be the place
Climate + memory
I’ve been thinking about memory, and doing so has precluded me from having the sharpest of climate thoughts. Fuzzy thoughts can be lovely too, but in the over-crowded clamour for people’s beautiful and fractured minds, I think of Seth Godin’s dictum to respect people’s attention. It makes me want to keep the fuzz to myself, and spare the 6K people who affirm this newsletter’s existence my haze. Plus there’s soooo much climate comms out there now — unlike the landscape in which I birthed this newsletter way back in 2019. Thank you for your notes! I’m here, you’re here. We’re breathing. I drew some pictures:
Years ago I bought the domain TheSolastalgist, thinking I would chronicle stories of solastalgia. I was taken with the phrase, coined by Dr. Glenn Albrecht, about homesickness for places changed by climate. But nostalgia is a byproduct of wistful memory, and lately I’ve been feeling a generational layer of family stories ebb away, making the solastalgia all the more intense: It’s less about melancholy visions of air and textures changed, and more about the harsh erasure of places once loved. Because what is a place but the people in it? (Superstorms aren’t helping.)
Snatching at memory is, in some ways, like conservation. The preservationist in me wants the trees to be unchanged and the memories, too. Coming home to Florida after a storm and seeing huge swaths of tree cover disappeared can feel like memories physically hacked away.
Sarah, stop being soooo drippy…the world is fraught, but also alight with possibility.
I feel like we’re in the most profound window of a moment, with five years left to right the climate ship, and impossible emissions reductions to make that so. And while we know it, fully knowing it would be debilitating. So we allow ourselves to half know it, or two-thirds know it, in order to function. Which is not dissimilar to my family’s response to the memories of the ones we love best. We know, and we can deal, but also, we cannot deal.
Lately I’ve noticed that I grab onto little snippets that speak to me, even more than usual. I’ve always been a filer of climate studies, reports, and art, but these days I’m a Joseph Cornell box of climate, a lazy wunderkammerist.
I flip these collages over and over in my mind, as if doing so will etch them there, secure them tight in my brain forever. If I hear a brilliant climate koan while running, I will carry it ten clicks home, by mnemonic or song — I’ll sing some podcast pith to whatever tune comes to mind, in the hopes I’ll remember to record it. I could screengrab it or write it down, but it’s as if I’m testing myself to see what my mind will choose to hold. Climate…memory…climate…cookies.
I watch older folks too, and admire their ability to keep a koan. I went to hear the legendary community organizer Marshall Ganz speak on Friday and each sentence came loaded with gems: a lifetime of accrued wisdom that he can seamlessly stitch together in patterns most resplendent.
The climate news has been too much of late, so I’ve taken extra care to preserve my energy. I lift heavy things (the actual weight of the world?) alongside my friends, I read Miranda July to feel my 40s rage and power, I take dance classes, I bake Ruffles Rice Krispie treats with my daughter, and watch football documentaries with my son. It is a luxury to be able to do this when I need to, and I acknowledge that privilege.
And I take comfort in the rising up of so much energy to do the work together, to nurture communities of love and support for what lies ahead, from a climate, democracy, or doing the laundry perspective. A few weeks ago my cousin was coming for Shabbat dinner. He’d offered to bring a challah, but when he popped by the bakery on his way home from work, they were sold out. My house is never short of bread products, and I’m not above blessing a pizza crust, so we weren’t put out. But a few minutes later, the doorbell rang. My neighbor was practicing her baking, and had made me a challah. It was still warm. She couldn’t have known her timing.
I do not want to extrapolate this to a grand narrative that imagines something will help us pull it all out in the end. I don’t want to fetishize hope and positivity — this newsletter takes pains to be real, with a dose of chocolate chips. But I do want to focus on people. People are all we’ve got. Let’s bake for each other. And remember what it feels like to do so.
STUFF
Ripping out trees and bike lanes in Toronto is enough to make you scream. Which is what we did at DarkDancingTO. Cannot recommend this enough.
Now carbon is more important than later carbon. Lloyd Alter.
Rare Conversations. Here’s a recording and recap of a conversation I got to have with the amazing Kevin Green of Rare. If you were ever wondering, can you do ballet in a heat pump costume? Yes, yes you can.
We Don’t Have Time. Who gets to say whether we’re going slow or fast? In this case, with the EV transition. Got to be on a panel with the incredible David Fenton and Angela Hultberg at Climate Week.
Electrifying Research. In my day job at Rewiring America, we do so much cool climate comms research. This Thursday, we present our fourth Electrifying Research, including some work I helped shape (read more here!) with the fantastic Behavioural Insights Team, my colleague JahAsia’s incredible research, and the ACEEE’s Reuven Sussman. You should come!
Parties for people. Wrote this for our Rewiring Newsletter, The Current. Give people something fun and meaningful to do. Previous writing on turning protests into parties here, and here, in comic form from 2015!
People dancing
This is the most amazing party dancing in the history of time, no?
How are you doing? I hope you’re safe, healthy, and happy as possible. Always let me know how to make this newsletter better!
Thanks for reading,
Sarah
“Beauty sneaks in everywhere” love that/photo
I enjoy your letters very much. I'm overwhelmed these days, but I tried to take it in! Thank you!