Well Tallinn is finally snowed in …. we only had to wait until the last week of March! When you hear reports in Tallinn that the city is in gridlock because infrastructure can’t keep up with snowfall… folks, that’s a lot of snow.
I’m welcoming the change in weather - even if it does delay the beautiful Estonian spring. I get to work from home most days and I don’t have a walkway to shovel. I just look out my window and everything looks extra pretty. But it’s definitely creating trouble for folks “out there”.
The problem of course is the timing. For most of us urban folk the presence or absence of snow is mostly a matter of to shover or not to shovel, slippery roads or not. But for some folks - farmers in particular - having some predictability in the seasons can make or break your livelihood. For others, changes in weather can translate to entire changes in environment or can even generate forces that wipe out entire communities.
In my circles there is a wide range of opinion about the reality and causes of climate change (and one’s opinion seems to locate them on the political spectrum either as a “fuzzy headed liberal” or a “cranky conservative”). There’s no doubt in my mind that the erratic changes in timing, location and intensity of weather patterns in the last decade are at least “out of the ordinary”. That may be a regular phenomenon that just happens to crop up every century or so and will eventually correct itself OR it may in fact be due to global warming. I tend to think there is more evidence currently on hand for the latter. But in the end, the cause is not so important to me as the question about whether or not we ought to expend effort trying to counteract the changes.
Some folks argue that even if erratic weather is due to global warming, there’s nothing we can do about it, so why get worked up? Well in my opinion, as long as there is evidence that these weather changes are contributing to loss of human life or quality of life or are threatening the future of the planet, I think we have a moral responsibility as care takers of creation to do whatever can be done, no matter how small. We may not avert the “end of the world” scenarios some predict (seems some people would welcome such an end) or even have any effect at all on the system as it now stands but at least we can say that we have done our responsible best.
Looks like the sun has just peaked out and the snow flurries have stopped. I could keep going on this topic for a while still (and may pick it up again at some point) but this is my signal to drop this line of thought and get outside to enjoy the weather while it lasts. Who knows how long it will be until Estonia sees this much snow again.
* For an interesting take on the debate, check out this guy’s approach on YouTube.
Tags: Environment, features
