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Posts Tagged ‘climate’

To a Future of Promise and Ingenuity

Posted in Writing, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on January 23, 2025| Leave a Comment »

Perhaps you remember me mentioning the submission call for this year’s Grist climate collection. Folks submitted (1200 of them!), editors did their editing thing, and now we have a brand new collection of free climate stories for 2025!

Here’s the full collection, including twelve new stories with the goal of looking “beyond the current moment to picture what could be.”

Imagine 2200 climate fiction contest: The 2025 collection – Grist

Welcome to the 2025 Imagine 2200: Climate Fiction for Future Ancestors collection. For four years, this contest has celebrated stories that invite us to imagine the future we want — futures in which climate solutions flourish and we all thrive. These stories have never pretended the path will be easy — some of the most compelling Imagine stories showcase the struggle as well as the successes — but they all offer the promise that through the transformative power of radical imagining, we can envision a better world and work toward making it our reality.

Yes, please!

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Photo by Vitolda Klein on Unsplash

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The 2025 NRDC Climate Storytelling Fellowship

Posted in Writing, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on October 13, 2024| Leave a Comment »

I don’t write screenplays, but perhaps you do? If so, consider this new grant from The Black List, the NRDC’s (Natural Resources Defense Council) Rewrite the Future program, The Redford Center, The CAA Foundation, and NBCUniversal.

That’s a lot of organizations getting behind climate storytelling. If you want in, here’s how!

2025 NRDC Climate Storytelling Fellowship | The Black List

We need it all–the bleak and the inspirational, the fantasies, dramas, comedies, and rom-coms. It is the power and privilege of writers to show us how climate change is transforming our world, and to help us find a path to salvation. This program aims to support well told stories with climate themes that entertain viewers and allow them to engage with the range of emotions caused by the climate crisis. 

Application deadline is December 05, 2024.

Even if you aren’t into screenplays or don’t want to navigate The Black List sign up/apply for a fee waiver process, you may want to check out the list of Writer’s Resources at the bottom of the description page.

Examples include the Sustainability Onscreen Tipsheet and The Last Laugh: Comedy in the Age of Climate Change.

Because whatever else happens, the future needs laughter.

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Photo by Teja J on Pexels.com

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Para Sol

Posted in Other, tagged , , , , , , , , on June 18, 2024| Leave a Comment »

Millions are under extreme heat warnings today as we begin a multi-day heat event, myself included. Because climate!

Public health officers across the continent are speaking out, hoping to keep people safe. A lot of outlets have dramatic headlines about this heat wave, and rightfully so. Here’s one from my locale:

Ottawa Public Health prepares for ‘life-threatening’ heat event

If you are young, old, pregnant or on diuretics, be extra careful. If you have air conditioning, you’ll probably definitely need to use it. If you do not have air conditioning or a temperature-controlled cave / subterranean lair, it makes sense to find a place to cool down.

Options: Head to a library, mall, museum, pool, rec center or coffee shop. A lot of cities have their own cooling center maps (here’s Ottawa’s, and New York’s and Austin’s, for example). You can also search for “cooling centers near me” or find more info by US state here: Cooling Centers by State.

If you have to spend time outdoors? Hats, sunblock and shade are your friends. Stay hydrated, and maybe pack a parasol.

Fun facts:

  • don’t use a fan to blow extremely hot air on yourself. This can cause heat exhaustion to happen faster (OPH)
  • Pets need to stay cool, too! (citation: common sense). For tips, see Keep pets safe in the heat.
  • Avoid or minimize drinking alcohol and caffeinated drinks (coffee, tea, and some carbonated drinks) (aww, you’re no fun OPH, but mocktails are a-ok)
  • parasol: borrowed from French, “screen or canopy shielding from the sun,” going back to Middle French, borrowed from Italian parasole, from para “(it) shields, keeps out” (3rd singular present of parare “to prepare, adorn, avert, shield”) + sole “sun,” going back to Latin sōl (MW). 

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Photo by guy stevens on Unsplash

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Meteor Descending

Posted in Writing, tagged , , , , , , , , , on October 21, 2022| Leave a Comment »

Author notes: Let me say up front that there are a lot of things wrong with this story, technically speaking:

  • First, it was supposed to be a drabble, and at just under 200 words that clearly has not happened.
  • Second, even the North Atlantic Octopus doesn’t go as deep as the Titanic, which sits at 12,600 feet below.
  • Third, the octopus is a relatively solitary creature and would probably skip the classroom for more of an independent study sort of situation.
  • And finally, the idea that an octopus would care about the fate of salmon is, of course, patently ridiculous.

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Meteor Descending

Ironically, the first human words Ololilon puzzled out were from a menu. He’d come across the wreck while riding the current.

Metal loomed from the dark, a gaping hole in its side. Oli swam past a deck chair and through a gap in the torn metal, pushing deep into the remnant.

Few would have been able to decipher the fading text. Even in the Cold Deep time has meaning. And this fallen star had been resting on the ocean floor for lifetimes. 

But Oli’s eyes were adapted to the dark. Each shimmering wavelength told a tale, and this story was one of horror.

Chicken, peas and rice meant nothing to him, but oysters and salmon? Cousins and neighbors. Consumed.

But while this message was one of horror, it also bore hope.

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“Teacher, my podmate says aliens aren’t even real.” 

Ololilon’s classroom was full. Spawning season had ended and it was a perfect time to teach the juveniles English. They would need it.

“Their meteors are real enough. And if we can learn how to speak with them,“ Oli said, tentacles swaying with emotion, “perhaps we can keep them from killing us all.”

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Photo by NOAA on Unsplash

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Risk/Reward

Posted in Writing, tagged , , , , , , , , , on May 5, 2022| Leave a Comment »

Today, another free installment from Anthropocene’s Climate Parables series.

Dodging the Apocalypse | Mark Alpert

Yo, fellow defenders of our beautiful planet, happy Monday and happy Earth Day! What a crazy week, right? I’m guessing you’ve heard about my adventures in New Mexico; they were all over the freakin’ news. So first let me send a shout out to you, my loyal listeners, for your amazing support of this graying environmental correspondent. Without you, I’d probably still be in jail.

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Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

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