Cold

Years ago I used to know a man called Joe who was a keen gardener both in his own plot and as he travelled round earning a bob or two doing other people's gardens.  Whenever I called, he would take me out to show me how his beans, dahlias, rhubarb, whatever, were doing . . . and at some point in the conversation he would always manage to tell me, "I've never known a season like it!"  Occasionally, he would say those words with positive emphasis and a smile on his face, but not very often.  Mostly they were accompanied by a despairing shake of the head and a worried expression.

Well, Joe, if you're looking down on Spring 2012, I think your catchphrase would be very appropriate, perhaps more so than on any of the spring mornings I spent looking at your garden.  It may look nice, and this morning's bright sunshine was certainly very attractive;  but we've had a wind today that sliced through you, and there's more to come.  Today's "Daily Express" - maybe not the most reliable of meteorological indicators, but they do seem to delight in making the weather prospects for the season their banner headline, whatever else is going on in the world - tells us that the whole of May will be full of rainstorms, winds, night frosts and snow on higher ground.  No summer until June, they say (adding, sotto voce, "If then").  Who knows, they may well be right.

So what price global warming, you may ask.  Well, do not confuse climate with weather;  nor be too surprised that our little Atlantic island should see so much variation in its spring weather (last year, beaches packed with happy holiday-makers;  this year, one man and his dog, if that).  Just the same changes and chances seem to be a feature of, for example, Gilbert White's "Natural History of Selborne" - and no doubt parishioners there were saying, like Joe, "I've never known a season like it!"  Whatever else our weather is, it isn't boring.

Meanwhile, even though variations in weather patterns really are just that and no more, there is a serious issue of climate change still to consider.  I would say that global warming does seem to be a measurable fact;  and to me those who deny it seem to be either ignoring or distorting perfectly good scientific data in order to press their case. Of course, having said that, there is still a real question about whether at all, or to what extent, human activity plays a part in causing global warming.  It may not be the principal motor for climate change;  the observable data may for the most part be caused by natural cycles and fluctuations.  But how much does that matter, anyway?  For, whatever causes global warming, this is clearly the case as regards our human use of the earth:  that (a) we are using the earth's resources in an unsustainable way, and (b) we are living - those of us in the richer communities of our globe - at a level and standard of luxury that cannot be shared by the others who look on enviously, and (c) even if our activity is not having a terminally decisive impact on the earth, it does have some impact none the less, it is doing damage.

So we should "live more simply, that others may simply live", to borrow a slogan.  We should, surely, be looking to tread as lightly as we can manage on the surface of our planet.  I can cope with a bit of unseasonably cold weather in May;  it's just one of those things.  But I shall not be tempted to use it as a reason to dismiss the climate change lobby, nor as an excuse to persist in the greedy exploitation of our planet's precious gifts.