Climate refugee discussion

"I am a climate refugee" triggered a bevy of unusual responses

I was struck by the depth of the climate migration stories that came to my inbox after my last essay.

First, read “I am a climate refugee” and then come back here. 😀

THANK YOU. Now you have the context. 👍🏻

This is an "extra” post (I usually post 1x week on Tuesdays, in case wondering) and it is generated by the unusual activity the climate refugee post generated. I usually get li❤️ responses only on the posts people like/resonate with. (I’m always surprised by which posts those are.) And, relative to the number of people who read a post, very few comment. I get that; I only comment on essays when I really like or disagree with something or have something relevant to add.

This post, however generated more private, direct messages to me than any other ever has.

People didn’t want to be public about the thoughts, feelings, guilt and fear that were on their minds and hearts regarding climate migration.

My first clue I’d hit a nerve was a total stranger (not a book fan or anything) who read the post and tracked down my contact page on my website and poured out worries there: “I just read your Passages email about being a climate refugee. I am trying to figure out where in the West we can move (currently in Florida that we hate but where we moved due to aging parents who have since passed). My partner is a native of Southern California but between the high cost of living and the environmental issues now worsening there, I don't think we will end up there. Washington and Oregon are on my radar but I worry about adding 2 more people to stress those states as well. Some days I wish I didn't care so much because then it wouldn't be so hard to decide.”

This person felt GUILTY about becoming a climate migrant.

I didn’t name that guilt in my post—but YES, we felt it too!

We didn’t want to be part of the floods of people heading to safer states and stressing out infrastructure and systems and driving up real estate values!

Locals’ grumbling, (especially in “hot” areas of migration) is valid.

Not being able to make a left turn because of traffic is real.

Overblown real estate prices and ridiculous rentals pressuring an economy…real.

No professionals taking new clients in areas of climate migration growth? REAL.

And the guilt about being a part of all of this? Real.

Here’s what I said to to K who wrote me at the website:

“Hi there! I see people like us (semi-retired and active) as positives to states/countries we choose to move to because :

1) we come with our own income streams. We're not taking jobs from the locals.

2) we are active volunteers and conservation practitioners and help others for free.

3) we pay high taxes willingly and happily, and spend spend spend! to stimulate our local economy.

As I said in my article, the area we chose (i.e. that we could afford to buy in) is depressed and not particularly hot like Bend or Portland. We are enhancing our nowhere town by buying there, remodeling a fixer, and getting involved with the town’s improvement. Rumors that migrants like us are resented by locals are greatly exaggerated so far.”

K responded that she hadn’t considered it that way, and it had opened her eyes to a different perspective.

My dad, who lives on Maui, texted me after reading the essay to tell me he was very unhappy with conditions in South Maui; during winter they’ve had catastrophic floods and in summer, high heat, volcanic emissions (nicknamed vog) bugs, and tons of traffic and overuse of beaches from tourists with “no respect or interest in culture or aloha.” He hardly ventures out of the house during the day and grieves about how the island has changed, especially since COVID.

He’s not the only person I’ve heard from about conditions in our beloved Hawaii Nei. I am in love with Hawaii and always will be—but I no longer want to live there full time. My heart kinda breaks even to admit it. I feel so disloyal to a place I grew up in, advocate for, and write about extensively. '

But it’s changed, so have I, and so have my needs in this last third of my life.

Have you heard of the story of the frog in hot water? I think most people have.

This from Wikipedia: “The boiling frog is an apologue describing a frog being slowly boiled alive. The premise is that if a frog is put suddenly into boiling water, it will jump out, but if the frog is put in tepid water which is then brought to a boil slowly, it will not perceive the danger and will be cooked to death.

The story is often used as a metaphor for the inability or unwillingness of people to react to or be aware of sinister threats that arise gradually rather than suddenly.”

I was trying to find out if the story was true; Wikipedia says some 19th century experiments agree it IS true, but only if the water was very, very gradually heated. “And a frog dropped into boiling water doesn’t jump out…it dies immediately.”

Sobering, isn’t it?

UGH.

I hate all of this so much and wish it weren’t happening to our planet with a passion that brings me to tears.

However climate change started, it’s already in motion and likely too late for more than occasional flashbacks to “the way it was.”

Another friend emailed me, expressing the same mix of guilt/fear/intertia/grief that many have articulated in the comments section on the piece, and to me privately. “There’s a part of me that doesn’t feel it’s right or fair to leave. I am so conflicted.”

Yes. And again, yes. 💔 💔💔 👈🏻 see the broken hearts? None of this is easy stuff.

This is part of the climate migration story.

To move somewhere new, we must endure and persevere past those difficult feelings to choose the risk of moving in hopes of a better, safer life somewhere else…and then, we still must go through the difficult and unpleasant actual work of moving, followed by the uncomfortableness of acclimating to a new area in which everything, from vet to taxes to a dentist, must be rebuilt.

I am a former therapist. I often would say to clients struggling with making change, “People don’t change their behavior unless they’re UNCOMFORTABLE enough, or WANT SOMETHING enough.”

You can quote me on that and take it to the bank. It’s a tried and tested truth you’ll see all around you.

I most often said this to parents of misbehaving teens who wound up in my office complaining about their kids, but unwilling to do anything about their dynamics. Even simple things like removing a phone seemed impossible to them; they were hostage to their own desire for comfort, unwilling to face the wrath of their kids.

“Nothing is going to change as long as the kid isn’t uncomfortable and generally has what they want. Sorry, parent, you have to be willing to be uncomfortable first.”

(spoiler alert: that goes for all of us.)

A parent’s ongoing, difficult job is to create the squeeze necessary to help the kid grow into their highest potential. For their best interest long term, that often means EVERYONE in the family is uncomfortable for a time, beginning with parents.

What does this have to do with climate change migration?

Mike and I both have degrees in human behavior. We knew the principle of “uncomfortable and wanting something hard enough fuels change” more than most.

We could see and judge our own behavior in that light.

In choosing to make our climate migration, we were uncomfortable enough in our fiery/floody part of California to WANT to be somewhere safe more than we wanted to settle in where we were, hoping for better times.

We wanted to move before we were actually burnt out of our home.

Many wait until they are burnt out, and then rebuild in the same place. They cling and hope, like the frog in the pot. Maybe they will be okay, and lightning won’t strike twice. I hope so. I personally wasn’t willing to double down and cross my fingers in my corner of the redwoods with the smell of smoke all around me. My level of uncomfortable was coupled with intense wanting, enough to overcome massive barriers.

Does that make sense?

That same interior battle of uncomfortable vs. wanting takes place within everyone who takes a risk for a possible better future.

One fearless climate migrant left Hawaii 40 years ago. Here’s what he said: “We moved from Honolulu in our early 30's and made a grid to help decide where to. First, we wrote down 8 'needs': Friends/Family, Land, Job, Social Environment, Cosmopolitan, Physical Environment, Weather, University. Then we each made a grid of these, 8x8, and then chose one against the other in terms of importance. If Friends/Family got 6 votes against 6 other desires, then it got 6 votes. Ranked Choice Voting. My final ranking of importance of the 8 is as I listed. P's was somewhat different, but not so much that we couldn't move together! So, we ended up where we are for the past 40 years. (our next list will probably include such mundane things as single level, walk-in shower, bus line.....)”

I absolutely loved this story; he and his wife took our list and made it even more specific. This man was so happy with his move that wherever this place is, they have stayed for 40 years.

I hope to make it to the finish line here in Oregon, but there might yet be another move in our future that includes the “single level, walk in shower, bus line” elements he lists.

As our bodies change, our needs change too.

Please don’t be afraid to make a move that will make your life better…and if you do, resolve to be a postive addition to the state, country, or town you move to.

Bring your skills, talents, money, and a humble attitude of gratitude—and chances are, your new home will welcome you; if not immediately, then in time.

This book of poetry is a Field Guide to life

Orcas by Jarod Anderson
Somewhere, there are orcas.
I’m in my little gray house in Ohio
surrounded by the stale air of winter indoors
But somewhere there are orcas.
It's an easy fact to forget.
It’s easy to shrink your world to what you can see.
but thankfully, somewhere there are orcas.
Sometimes, my world is all sun-faded plastc
scrawled along the roadside in a scribble of petty meanness,
But somewhere there are orcas.
We all know facts that are inert as chalk dust
but some knowledge is medicine.

For times like these, poetry is the language my heart seeks, and uses to understand. 

This slim volume sent to me from my beloved college mentor and mom-of-the-heart, Judy, speaks truth to me over and over as I leave it lie on the breakfast bar where I take a lunch break from writing to eat and gaze on a my back yard wetland, fierce with green and beloved of wood ducks and a single fat, mellow nutria, creatures I’d never seen before moving here.

Jarod Andersen, whoever he is, speaks to our modern angst, existential separation, and ancient roots. His poetry helps us find our place in the natural world, and reconnect with it.

A Time for Choice by Jarod Anderson
You are the mountain, but awake.
You are the rain, but breathing.
You are the forest, but unanchored.
You are the soil, but with choice.
You are the sunlight, but dreaming.
Soon, you will be these things again. Mountain. Rain. Forest. Sunlight.
So, what will you do until then?

If this post resonated, hit the ❤️, pass it on, and add a comment below. I’d be so grateful the know your thoughts on this. Aloha, Toby