Weather report

Walking with the dogs in one of their favourite fields, I notice that the moss is blooming. It's growing - as we are told it will - on the north side of the rocks, old split rails and the older beech tree. It's brilliant colour indicates new growth. In February!

Goodness.

This area has in the past 10 years I've lived here, been under three or four feet of snow.

Everywhere around the world we are experiencing different weather patterns. Cold where it should be warm, warm where it should be cold. Drier where drought is threatening life itself, and deluges, floods and disasters in other places where life is being swept away: human, animal and vegitative life.

As I look at the moss, I think how beautiful. The rocks piled by some early pioneer in this area to clear a field, tree by tree, stone by stone, old fencing remains, scattered now and forgotten. Probably this pile was made and this fence built in the very early 1800s. There are similar signs of man's attempts to control and cultivate land for everything from growing food and to building cities everywhere in the world.

It sets my mind wandering about the weather changes. So often man's attempts to control and manicure in the past haven't taken into account the natural weather patterns which are now so exaggerated. The push and drive for more, for "growth," for excess, doesn't often consider the side effects of what this direction could bring.

We're told it's not climate change, that what we are experiencing is part of a natural cycle, sometimes a 10,000 year cycle, sometimes an 11 year cycle. that it was just like this 20 years ago. Numbers don't make much difference if your home is threatened and your livelihood. So it doesn't matter who is right or wrong, it just is. But can we do anything about it?

There is no question that this year is different. Perhaps it seems more monumental because we are so connected around the world. Technology allows us to see what's happening as it happens in countries half way round the world. Are we paying attention to all the effects of this I wonder? Or are we becoming accustomed and therefore immune to the disasters, the misery that happens to individuals, villages, towns and countries. Is it all like a tv show? Something that isn't real?

Or are some starting to realize that it's time we paid attention?