Helen in the Gobi Desert 2018, Dispatches from the Great Burning — Helen in the Gobi Desert 2018, *Dispatches from the Great Burning*

The Opposite of Despair

This past year we have struggled through the biggest pandemic in living memory, the most critical election in 100 years, massive economic uncertainty, and the total upheaval of our personal lives. Yet while this foreground has had our rapt attention, an even bigger crisis has continued to unfold in the background. We as humans have - with only a momentary COVID lapse – continued to pump 40 Billions tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere every year, an amount equal to the total weight of all people on earth. Times 22.

Let’s take that again. Imagine. The weight of everyone on earth. Times 22. That’s the weight of carbon emissions pumped into the heavens every year.

And it is slowly – and not so slowly – killing us and all life.

If your eyes glaze over at this unfathomable amount of global-warming poison, I’m with you. Can’t absorb it. Overwhelmed. The stuff of nightmares and despair. And as my smart, educated Paris niece recently said to me: “I knew it was serious, but I didn’t know it was THAT serious.”

It is.

The opposite of despair is action. Not hope. Action. So this is the moment when we each need to ask ourselves: What is the boldest step I can take to help halt our relentless march toward extinction?

Dispatches from the Great Burning - Near You?

My response to the above question is Dispatches from the Great Burning: What My Mennonite Ancestors and the Gobi Bear Taught Me About Surviving the Climate Emergency, which I’ve spent the last year performing live and on Zoom. It is the story of my own reckoning with the climate crisis, drawing on the survival stories of my Mennonite foremothers, my search for the Gobi bear in the Mongolian desert, and my evolution into a climate activist. It’s my way of getting people to talk about and wrestle deeply with the biggest crisis we’ve ever faced as humans.

This “from the heart”, not “from the head” engagement is a necessary first step to taking meaningful action. While we all hear facts (like the one I shared at the top of this blog), they do not move us to act. The compulsion to act comes from the heart, which is why sharing our stories is so important. It’s also why I offer the Dispatches Workshop to give people a space in which to share their own narratives of longing, grief, and hope about the climate emergency.

It’s time to get Dispatches out into the world. Word of mouth is best. I invite you to take a moment and think of a classroom, conference, meeting, gathering, club, religious, political or civic group that might be interested in presenting this 50-minute live Zoom performance, followed by an audience discussion that includes concrete steps to halt the madness. For details and to watch performance excerpts visit Dispatches.

Let me know people and places you think would be interested. Zap me names, association/organization, and contact information: swan@blackswanarts.org Please include your phone number so I can call you. Thanks!

San Francisco Street Mural Action protesting Wells Fargo’s funding of Line 3 Pipeline; April 2021; foreground mural by First Mennonite Church of San Francisco

Your Boldest Step?

As to your own answer to the question: “What is the boldest step I can take to help halt our relentless march toward extinction?” (or whatever words you use to describe our climate crisis), I welcome your responses! Please be specific! For example, my one sentence would be: “I’m performing a 50 min. play, Dispatches from the Great Burning, about personally coming to terms with the climate crisis.”

Please send me your one-sentence answers to: swan@blackswanarts.org It may be a step you are taking or one you would take (if you were truly bold). Let me know if I have your permission to post your responses here – anonymously.

I’m truly curious to know how the rest of you are dealing with these apocalyptic times we find ourselves in – and not surprisingly – I have some great suggestions for concrete action, coming soon in “Keeping Despair at Bay: Part Two”.

In action,

Helen