Everything is on fire

The Midwest is not a climate change haven

Let me tell you about last Tuesday. It was mostly an ordinary Tuesday, except that the sky above our lakeside town was blanketed in a white haze. We’re no strangers to fog here — it’s a frequent sight on the Great Lakes. Frankly I thought the haze would be pretty much the same as fog, but that was a gross misjudgment.

We had heard that there was smoke drifting its way southwest from the wildfires in Ontario and Quebec, so I went out to buy an air purifier and some N95 masks. Once I opened my car door in the Target parking lot, a gust of wind blew directly into my face and sent the smell of burning trees directly up my nostrils. It was nearly the same experience as being the unfortunate soul at the bonfire who gets a face full of smoke when the wind blows at just the right angle.

“Jesus Christ,” I muttered. I’m not someone who usually talks to themselves, nor takes the Lord’s name in vain thanks to my Catholic upbringing. But stepping outside into what smelled exactly like a bonfire was enough to metaphorically knock me off my feet.

Here in the Midwest, we haven’t dealt with wildfires in the same way as people who live on the West Coast. Wisconsin certainly has a wildfire season — it typically happens in the spring — but for the most part, these fires aren’t nearly as big or dangerous. People like me who live in towns and cities along the lake rarely notice when fire season happens. This year feels different though.

I’ve had very few experiences of being trapped in an inescapable, immediate disaster, one you can’t outrun at any cost. Now, I can add last week’s bonfire skies to the slowly growing list.

I made a few trips downtown to a coworking space to get some work done but limited my time outside because it felt horrible to be in the smog. Anytime I went walking without a mask on, I felt abnormally sluggish and slightly dizzy. After a single short trip to the mailbox, my eyes burned.

Going indoors was the only reprieve, and also an annoying one. In our home, we almost always have the windows open so we can hear the birds singing and let in fresh air, but last week we ran the AC units all day along with the air purifier. We were thankful to not breathe in the smog, but nonetheless cooped up and frustrated.

The one silver lining was watching for our favorite backyard bird, a robin we named Harv. He has a distinctive white crown around his head and is very easy to tell apart from the other birds. To our relief, Harv was hopping around like normal and screaming from the trees and rooftops. We wanted to bring him inside and hold him up to the air purifier, but that probably would have been traumatizing.

For the most part, I got the impression that people here have no idea how to deal with wildfire smoke. The neighborhood kids were out on their bikes and playing in the backyard on the first day. I saw people driving around with their windows down, which was … a choice. The most memorable sight was a woman smoking a cigarette outside of Target as the smoke-filled air blew into her face.

We heard from friends who got headaches, coughs, and just felt generally off. I can’t imagine how the postal workers or trash collectors or landscapers felt at the end of their long days. On Tuesday, there was a group of guys laying asphalt in one of the apartment parking lots. I didn’t see them leave until the sun went down.

Honestly, why would we know how to deal with wildfires, anyway? We don’t usually have those kinds of disasters here. The unfortunate reality is that this probably won’t be the last time something like this happens, so we better learn how to deal with it. In places like Quebec and Ontario, climate change is leading to hotter and drier conditions, and in turn bigger and more out-of-control fires. We’ve seen the same thing happen in California and other parts of the West in recent years.

Even if the fires aren’t happening right in the Midwest, we are still susceptible to their effects. It still blows my mind how a disaster happening nearly a thousand miles away could be seen from my own backyard last week.

It also makes me nervous that we’ve had an abnormally dry summer here as well. Who’s to say we won’t have a fire that gets out of control in the near future?

Last weekend I went to a local marsh with my partner and a friend, only to find it dried up except for a layer of sticky mud. We saw frogs and lots of plant life, but some of the usual suspects weren’t there. Last time we visited, the warm, wet conditions invited coots, soras, and other water-loving birds that thrive in wetlands. This time, we noticed their absence.

And while I know there’s gonna be a learning curve for people here with wildfire preparedness, I’m worried about the folks who are truly clueless. We were driving past the beach yesterday and saw smoke, later to learn that someone set off fireworks and started a grass fire. Today, I heard about another grass fire near the highway just a few miles from our apartment.

I want to dispel the narrative that the Midwest is some kind of climate-change haven. I see this idea every now and then on blogs and forums and op-eds, and I hate it. I hate it even though I want to believe it, but the truth is that nowhere is safe from unpredictable climate disasters. Especially when they’re massive, out of control, and has the ability to affect people living literally a country away.

I don’t want to be a climate doomer, but the events of last week have been impossible to ignore. For now I’m hoping that the birds will return to the marsh and people will learn to not light off fireworks near dry grass. Mostly, I’m hoping that this week can just be a normal one.

The good news is that everyone I know is doing fine, including Harv. Right now I have the windows open and he’s tweeting away out there, like he’s been doing every evening.