Fantacies and Inevitabilities

Fantasies and Inevitabilities

July, 2026

We've just entered July and the heat of summer is already old news. Temperatures in the Midwest have been running higher than normal since January. Heat warnings are routine. And it's not just happening here. Europe has been cooking. The oceans are warmer than ever recorded.

The garden responds accordingly. The spinach, lettuce, and arugula bolts. The radishes get woody. But the tomatoes, peppers, and sweet corn take to the heat like a Finn to a sauna.

The people of the world carry on. Construction crews pace themselves, try to stay hydrated. Air conditioners hum, stressing an antiquated grid. Banks funnel money to fossil fuel companies in support of more fracking and drilling and pumping. Data centers appear like dandelions, demanding excessive electricity and water. A blanket of heat-trapping atmospheric gasses grows more dense by the day, as do its consequences. Decades-old climate predictions come to light even as promising green technologies enter the mainstream. A realization settles in: civilization’s influence on global climate will not end well.

There is a trilogy of books titled 2034, 2054, and 2084, novels by Elliot Ackerman and James Stavridis. The books imagine the future through the eyes of two men uniquely qualified to understand how it could unfold.

Elliot Ackerman is a former Marine Raider and CIA Special Activities Officer who completed five tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. James Stavridis is a retired four-star admiral and former supreme allied commander of NATO. Together they weave a cautionary tale rooted in emerging technology, geopolitics, and climate change. Though fiction, the books are based on solid science and a deep understanding of history, demographics, military strategy, and international power.

The impacts of a changing climate have influenced military strategies since the early 1990’s, when the Naval War College warned policymakers about its security risks. Since 2010, the Department of Defense included climate among its highest national security priorities—until the Trump regime took power.

The current administration has weakened considerations on climate change in strategic planning. Crucial safeguards and critical protections have been rolled back. The military’s preparedness for climate-related challenges have been compromised.

In the book 2034, the authors imagine a war between the US and China. In their follow-up novel, 2054, they explore a breakdown in American politics fueled by radical advances in artificial intelligence. And in 2084 they see a world devastated by climate change and threatened by yet another war.

From the website of Admiral Stavridis: “By the year 2084, the world is divided into equatorial countries that bear the brunt of the climate crisis—led by Nigeria, Brazil, and Indonesia—and wealthier countries like China and the US, beset by their own problems after a series of civil wars. Tensions between the two sets of countries have reached a breaking point, until finally the so-called Reparationist nations of the equator decide that only military force can bring them justice.”

This isn’t a Star Wars trilogy. It’s a plausible, cautionary tale based on current realities, written by a duo having a deep understanding of the threats facing our world today. But Admiral Stavridis remains optimistic, saying we can write a different destiny if we imagine it.

But will we?  Or will we continue to act surprised when weather extremes fully explained by a changed climate become more and more commonplace?  Will we divest from fossil fuels? Rise up against a corrupt distribution of wealth? Hold corporations accountable?

Stavridis, clinging to his unshakable optimism, says if we fail to adjust our trajectory and find our way to 2084 as his novel portrays, those standing will still find a way to carry on. That is optimism with a massive cost.

There are fantasies and there are inevitabilities.
We’re writing our sequel now, choosing our future with every barrel of oil burned, every forest preserved, every election, innovation, and act of indifference or courage. 

We’ll get to 2084 one hot July at a time, and history will judge us less by what we believed than by what we were willing to change.

What Raccoons Teach a Consumer

What Raccoons Teach a Consumer 

July, 2026

We have a problem with raccoons raiding our bird feeders. I heard about a gadget that could offer a solution—a solar-powered alarm triggered by motion.

  

Leaving bird feeders out overnight invites raccoons. Sunflower seed, suet cakes, sugar water for hummingbirds, fruit and jelly for orioles—everything gets eaten and licked clean by masked bandits. Feeders are often damaged or hauled off despite our efforts to make them inaccessible. We are forced to bring everything in before dark, which is an inconvenience and hassle. The alarm promised to make things better. I ordered it.

 

When it arrived I mounted it on a pole four feet from suet feeders hanging on the trunk of a big white pine. At dusk I ran a test. When the motion sensor detected me, red strobe lights flashed and the sound of gunshots and barking dogs rang out in deafening volume. This should work, I thought. 

That night, from our second floor bedroom, I repeatedly heard hounds and gunshots. The next morning the suet cakes were gone, the shepherd hooks bent, the hummingbird feeders disassembled. The alarm does what it claims to do with one minor exception—raccoons ignore it. It’s junk. 

A thoughtful man might see that the raccoons aren’t the problem—my unwillingness to tolerate a bit of inconvenience is. Maybe I should realize that every inconvenience doesn’t demand a solution, especially one involving a purchase. The impulse to buy, scaled to billions of people, becomes a culture that drives extraction, pollution, habitat loss, and climate change. A better solution is to accept a little inconvenience and live with fewer wants.

Edwin Way Teale was an American naturalist who wrote extensively about environmental conditions across North America from 1930–1980.  He said, “Reduce the complexity of life by eliminating the needless wants of life, and the labors of life reduce themselves.” It takes money to buy stuff. Money requires time and effort to earn. The less stuff we want, the less money we need. The less  we own, the less we have to take care of.

It’s not a novel concept, but a way of living espoused by Buddhists, early Christians, and Taoists. Socrates advocated for a life of moderation and simplicity. Thoreau promoted simple living as a way to connect with nature and find personal fulfillment. In the US, 86 percent of adults say they were raised in a religion, 70 percent as Christian. Minimalism as a biblical tenet has gained popularity in recent years. A commitment to a faith changes the way we think, live, and respond. A planet that allows life to exist deserves the same commitment.

 

We like convenience, but our desire to make things easier takes precedence over long term sustainability. Single use plastics permeate the environment and take centuries to break down. Microplastics flow in our veins, choke our oceans.  Ready-made foods, the newest fashion, the latest iPhone, an endless assortment of electronics, crowd the marketplace and distract us from what we really need. We’re quick to add to our wants without considering how they push ecosystems to breaking points. Consumerism contributes mightily to our environmental woes.

 

There’s irony here.  To avoid a little inconvenience I bought an electronic device with a plastic housing, solar panel, rechargeable battery, circuit board, shipping box, and instruction manual—the kind of stuff, when combined with the wants of a few billion people, fills cargo ships, expands mining operations, supports the oil industry, and occupies landfills. 

The best path toward sustainability isn’t another invention or fashion design or knickknack. Every impulse to buy doesn’t have to be followed. Every problem doesn’t require a solution. At the top of our list of wants should be learning to live comfortably with less, for our sake and the sake of an ailing planet.  

Passion is Optional

 Passion is Optional 

June, 2026

I remember the day I visited my grandpa with a Daisy BB gun in hand. Grandpa was a farmer when he wasn’t pursuing wild game, and I was a lad wanting to test my sharpshooting skills.

I told him I wanted to shoot a mouse. His eyes narrowed. “Go to the granary and sit quiet. You’ll find your mouse.”

I did as directed and within seconds was surrounded by a flurry of rodents, poking their heads from between grain-filled bags, scurrying up the walls, darting across the floor. I was ecstatic. I don’t think a single BB ever connected with its intended target, but I had a great time and declared grandpa a master hunting guide. From that day I wanted to live in his shadow. 

There are people born with a fervor for the natural world and people passionate about music, math, baseball, or nothing in particular.

And so it’s always been. Indigenous tribes lived close to the land.  Some were dedicated hunters and trackers and others, no doubt, went along because participation was expected. Had food and clothing been readily available without hunting, their culture would likely have evolved differently. They may have developed a written language to replace generational storytelling as a way of passing on customs and history. Or maybe they would’ve developed technologies guided by the Iroquois principle that decision-making be based on the impact to the next seven generations.

Not everyone has an inherent interest in wildlife and wild places or is driven to understand ecological systems and our role in them. Aldo Leopold recognized this when he said “There are some who can live without wild things, and some who cannot. For us of the minority, the opportunity to see geese is more important than television, and the chance to find a pasque-flower is a right as inalienable as free speech.”

Few of us are introduced to the concepts of sustainability and carrying capacity in our formal education. We aren’t taught to hold in reverence a planet with finite resources, a thin, balanced atmosphere, and critical ecological interactions refined over eons.  Understanding that everything is intricately connected and in need of wise stewardship is not something we’re born with, and too often  it’s not given more than a passing thought. 

But it should. 

Today, with more than eight billion of us swarming the planet demanding more comforts and conveniences, living without an uncompromising understanding of our environmental impact is leading us down a perilous path. 

I was recently invited to a local book fair to promote my book of nature essays. I sold a few copies, but the experience reinforced what I knew to be true: The majority of attendees were not especially interested in essays about environmental challenges, even when they included reasons for hope. Other genres—mysteries, history, the paranormal—seemed to have more appeal.  

And that’s okay. We’re all different. If we were all consumed by wildlife, conservation, and natural history, many of our scientific and societal advancements would stall. We need people passionate about medicine, engineering, transportation, and politics. 

But every ambition, project, and decision needs to be weighed against its earthly impact. If it’s wasteful or unsustainable, it needs scrapping. Now that we’re fully aware of threats linked to ancient fuels, we need to wean ourselves of them. Now that we recognize the environmental risks associated with toxic chemicals in manufacturing and food production, we need to use our collective consumer influence to force change. We can’t ignore or justify ongoing destructive practices based on historical precedent.

We don’t have to be nature lovers to understand the imperative. But we do need to be aware and make enough noise to interrupt business as usual before the systems that sustain us collapse.

My grandpa loved the outdoors. He understood the habits of wild animals, including mice. But the concepts of ecological overshoot, sustainability, and planetary limits were rarely part of the conversation in his generation. 

They need to be a part of ours. 

There are growing pressures on this beautiful blue sphere. Reverence for the natural world and ecological literacy is not a niche hobby—it’s a survival skill for a crowded planet.

 

 

  

What Coyotes Can Teach a People

What Coyotes Can Teach a People

June, 2026

A new study by the University of Vermont found 58 percent of people worldwide favor protecting the environment over the economy.  In the US, the number dropped from 65 percent in 2020 to 50 percent today. A Gallup survey in 2023 showed 78 percent of Democrats believe the country should prioritize the environment over economic growth, compared with 20 percent of Republicans. 

Those numbers perfectly explain policy decisions coming out of Washington:

—Repeal of the Clean Power Plan

—Weakening Emissions Standards

—Elimination of the Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program 

—Reconsideration of Mercury and Air Toxic Standards 

—Dismantling the Endangerment Finding

—Withdrawal from the Paris Climate Agreement 

—Delays in Methane Emissions Regulation 

And sadly, there’s much more. 

A deep ocean monitoring system which, among other things, measures the impact of ocean warming, is being junked because our commander in chief denies the planet is warming despite overwhelming evidence. The monitors have been in place for more than 10 years and provide crucial data on physical, chemical, geological, and biological conditions in the ocean—information essential to understanding climate change, marine ecosystems, and ocean circulation patterns. 

It has me thinking. Before crossing the desert on a desolate highway, I should first disconnect the gas gauge on my Chevy lest I worry about getting stranded and cooked to death. Or maybe if radar shows a storm with embedded tornadoes closing in, I should throw the weather alert radio out the window and go to bed. No monitor, no worries.

Another policy of equal absurdity is the administration’s decision to bring back the use of M-44 “cyanide bombs” to control coyotes on BLM land.  The devices are spring loaded and baited, so an investigating coyote, dog, fox, child—anything attracted to the bait— gets a lethal dose of cyanide in the face and mouth and dies immediately or within a few agonizing hours. 

I first heard about M-44’s more than 50 years ago while an undergrad at Purdue. Even then the method was known to be ineffective. Yes, it killed coyotes along with non-targeted species, but did nothing to control actual coyote numbers. The survivors simply had larger litters to compensate for losses.

Coyotes are highly adaptable. They drink from swimming pools in Beverly Hills. They thrive in urban areas, utilizing green space and traveling roadways. Their diet is diverse and includes small mammals, fruits, insects, even garbage. Over the decades, despite being exposed to control measures effectively used against wolves, grizzlies, and cougars, coyotes have expanded their range to include every state but Hawaii, and in many areas have become commonplace.  

Resurrecting a method that is outdated, non-selective, and ineffective is just another action by an administration willing to defy science to pacify a handful of plutocrats. 

Then there’s the aggressive disassembling of the US Forest Service and its 121-year history of managing 193 million acres of public lands. Policymakers have determined that portions of the Service, including its world-renowned research branch, are expendable, along with the dedicated professionals and labs holding decades of irreplaceable long-term findings. Fifty-seven research facilities spread across 31 states will be shuttered.

But back to the coyotes. Since 2000, a long-term study of the wily canids in the Chicago area has been overseen by Stan Gehrt, wildlife ecologist with Ohio State University. Among his many findings, Gehrt learned that coyotes are staunchly monogamous and form life-long bonds. Only three to five percent of mammals practice monogamy, and DNA studies prove most include infidelities. Not so with coyotes in the Chicago study. The pair bond is absolute. The males never leave the female’s side during estrous and the females show no interest in other males. The result is a paternal investment where offspring carry the genes of a single male, giving him an evolutionary stake in keeping them alive. It’s an expenditure of parental energy rarely observed.

The study also found that if either of the pair were killed, the survivor would howl mournfully, show signs of lethargy, lose its appetite, and return often to the last known location of its mate.

There’s a lesson here—about persistence when faced with insurmountable odds, about mourning losses while never losing focus, about winning while staying true to what’s right—and it applies to our response to environmental threats. 

We’re on a perilous trajectory in dire need of a correction.  Only 50 percent of us want it changed. 

Suspended Between Extremes

May, 2026

I took a swim in the pond, the first of the year. It was good to stretch the joints and muscles, to feel the resistance, to dip below the surface and hear the distorted and muffled sounds of a watery world.

On my final lap I switched from freestyle to back stroke. The clouds had broken so the sky was a  patchwork of gray and blue. I focused on the blue, remembering a video that took a tour of the cosmos at the speed of light.

If we had the ability to move at light speed, we would leave our solar system in one earthly second. In four seconds we’d reach Proxima Centauri, our nearest star system. After eight seconds we’d approach Sirius, the brightest star in our night sky. In ten minutes we’d pass Kepler 226b, a distant world with a rocky core, covered by oceans.

For perspective, the Moon is about 1.3 light-seconds from Earth. It takes modern astronauts three days to get there. Using existing technology, reaching Kepler would take over 11 million years.

In two hours we’d pass the pillars of creation, one of the most iconic structures ever photographed—enormous towers of interstellar gas and dust inside the Eagle Nebula. In five hours we’d reach Stephenson 2-18, a star so enormous it makes our sun nearly invisible. Another 24 hours and we’d leave the Milky Way galaxy.  After 29 days we’d reach the Andromeda galaxy, which is on a collision course with our own galaxy a few billion years from now.

We’d travel on, and realize our local group of galaxies is but a tiny part of a much larger super cluster, and by the 16th year of travel the Milky Way would be a faint point in the darkness. One hundred years into our journey we’d reach Ton 618, one of the most massive black holes ever discovered, with a mass tens of billions of times that of our sun.

And after 1000 years of cruising one light year per second, we’d reach the edge of the observable universe, 46.5 billion light years from earth. It’s not the true edge, just the limit of what we can see.

With the aid of advanced telescopes, satellites, and physics modeling, we’ve detected galaxies billions of light years away, estimated the age of the universe, observed black holes, and measured the afterglow of the Big Bang. Yet, more than 80 percent of our oceans have not been mapped or explored. Oceans present unique challenges. The study area lies in a highly corrosive environment under a veil of perpetual darkness, with pressures a thousand times greater than found at sea level.

In all probability, those deep recesses of the unknown harbor life and functioning ecosystems. Scientists believe we’re familiar with less than a third of the highly specialized animals inhabiting the depths. Sixty percent of DNA sequences taken from marine sediments are not associated with known taxonomic records. Our understanding of deep sea biodiversity has major gaps, and it’s fair to say the ocean depths are less explored, observed, and mapped than the known universe. We have a better understanding of the surfaces of stars and planets multiple light years away than we do of the seafloor a few miles below the surface.

We know a lot about oceans—tides, currents, salinity, their role in thermodynamics and climate systems. It’s not accurate to say we know less about the oceans than the universe, but we know surprisingly little about the deep, dark, depths.

These thoughts drift through my head as I swim in a pond suspended between extremes. I lose track of laps. A cloud passes and I feel the penetrating warmth of a May sun on my face. A chimney swift twitters overhead, a green heron perches on a log near shore, a breeze sways the cattail leaves. The air smells of life in abundance.

What a privilege to draw breath and experience it all. To have curiosity, to consider the known and unknown, to learn. What a responsibility to care for the only known planet allowing us to live freely, without specialized gear or domes or engineered atmospheres. 

We’ve looked around the visible universe. There is no place better. We are charged with preserving what we have. There is an urgency here we’re dismissing, a mountain of scientific evidence we’re disregarding. In cosmic terms, we have a fraction of a heartbeat to respond.