Complexity and Complaints

It’s smoky again today and I’m really quite over it. If it feels like I’ve been talking about the wildfire smoke for the last two months, that’s because our area has basically been covered in medium to high levels of wildfire smoke for the last two months. Everyone is grumpy, frustrated, and eagerly awaiting the forecasted rain this weekend. If it comes. We’ve been tricked before.

Mostly, it feels like there must be something someone somewhere should be doing. I ended up looking into it and after a few hours of poking around weather blogs and smoke forecasts, it turns out the answer is yes. There is something someone somewhere could be doing. And they’re choosing not to.

And that choice not to act is the right one, even with the smoke.

The main fire that’s causing all of this frustration is right along the edge of one of the two highways that connect Eastern and Western Washington. This may sound confusing to my east coast brethren, but here in the wild west, the mountains mean business. Which means, for 4-5 months a year, all those cute mountain roads are covered in literally a dozen feet of snow. So there are two roads that connect our side to their side, and by extension, the rest of the country (unless you drive south and then east which can be dicey too).

As far as I understand it, the fire, which is along Route 2, is being treated very carefully because the usual fire management techniques will make those areas more likely to have mudslides when the rain returns. Again, remember that around here, the mountains mean business - the 2014 Oso mudslide killed 43 people. If Route 2 gets shut down, there’s only one way in or out. One way for trucks, busses, and passenger cars to get through. So we’re all just sitting in a giant cloud of smoke for a month.

I hate it. I hate that it smells like a campfire outside. I hate that we have to run our furnace fan to filter the air. I hate that my kids have to stay in at recess half the time. But I also admire the bravery of this decision, because I understand it. We live in a time where people complain about everything, all the time. There are entire facebook pages for our town where people pretty much whine about traffic, neighbors, kids, dogs, stores, and of course, the city government. And often, the things that are being complained about are really important and helpful - just not to the complainer. Why build nicer bus stops? I don’t ride the bus. Why create dog parks? I don’t have a dog. Why do they sell organic vegetables? I don’t buy them.

The world is complicated and as I age, I am realizing more and more that it takes courage to admit and accommodate that complexity. To sit in a smoky neighborhood and know that these decisions are hard and supported by data. For too long, our forest management practices were determined by common sense. Common sense that was short-sighted and wrong and mostly, based in an unwillingness to delve into the complexity and self-control of hard decisions.

And in the end, when the rain comes, and the smoke season is finally, finally over, we’ll be able to look back and remember that when our society knew better, it did better. One hard decision at a time.