Porch Blog 15 | amberdextrous's Blog

My front porch has been mostly uninhabitable for months now, as my city suffers through yet another record heatwave. At 6am today the temperature still hovers around 30C, expected to climb to 40+ for the fifth consecutive day.

In 1962 my parents fled the chilly winters of England, seeking the Australian sunshine. By 1989, when my Dad retired from his job as a photographer for the Commonwealth Government, they had had enough of Perth’s searing summers and moved further South, to Western Australia’s South-Westernmost point, where the Indian and Southern Oceans meet. At least there they could be assured of a cooling sea breeze in the evenings.

The availability of my work as a clown, storyteller and stand-up comedian meant that I had little option but to sweat it out in this sweltering city for another 25 years, but I can stand it no longer... I hereby vow that this will be my final year of frying in this boiled, baked and sun-cooked place.

Given that this is my son James’ final year of school, and the imminent immigration of my new Life Partner from snow-bound Canada, I intend to follow my parents’ example and to find somewhere closer to Antarctica to live; I have truly had enough.

This morning the breeze –such as it is- sighs in from the East-North-East, out of the centre of this dessicated continent, and the usually-chirpy birds seem stunned into silence. A family of magpies that farm the new-cut grass beyond my porch already look exhausted, their beaks open, panting, their wings held wide, away from their bodies. A pair of wagtails takes an early morning shower beneath the neighbours’ sprinklers; and a jogger does not bother to deviate from the footpath between the sprays, knowing she will dry out soon enough.

Climate change denialists use all manner of statistical tricks to “prove” that the steady warming trend of the past three decades is nothing but a left wing conspiracy, but in truth the figures speak for themselves: eleven of the past 12 years have each seen temperatures soar beyond all previous records; rainfall figures in this South-West corner of the continent have plummeted by 30 per cent in the past 35 years.

These patterns are exactly as predicted by the meteorological models plotting climate change. The high tide levels of the Indian Ocean have risen even further than forecasted.

Climate change is real, immediate, happening. My only option, if I am not to sweat myself to death, is to move to somewhere cooler. Augusta, here I come...