Climate change gets personal

The headlines say July was the warmest month in the world, ever. What we are seeing is that global warming or climate change means a sharp change in weather patterns, not just a warmer world, but it means that, too.

My daughter has had to evacuate her home in Winthrop two years in a row because of the fires. Farmers in the Palouse area have been unable to harvest a good wheat crop for two years. Most people in the usually wet Puget Sound area have been unable to water their lawn or garden this year. This is getting personal.

The future will require all of the cooperation and mutual support that we humans can find. Going it alone and hoping that things will not change is not an option. These things are happening even though some people deny that they are real or require action. We can’t escape the fact that the world is our home and we live in it together. The choices others make or avoid really do affect us every day.

Allan de Laubenfels

Spokane Valley