Fire is our friend in many circumstances. Perhaps the most obvious of these situations of excruciating need for fire can be understand by glancing at the sun. Our star, the sun, keeps us alive as a planet of diverse species. For a few more hundreds of millions of years I am told.
Fire is of course important in our ovens, on our stoves, in our fireplaces, in our campgrounds. But with a changing planet, that (as I have written in prior blogs) is unhappy with the way we have disregarded the impact of fossil fuel combustion, is biting back in a harsh and relentless way. On many continents, wild fires, in the forests or the grasslands, are devastating communities, wildlife, people. Lives are being lost, of humans and other animals. Billions of dollars of property is being erased. Our sensibilities are being shaken.
As long as we lead the world, diverse countries and other smaller geopolitical units by whim, ideology and frank stupidity, we shall burn. The question is – is it too late? My thoughts and feelings are with the front-line fire fighters, with those being burned and with a planet that needs our genuine complicity in caring.