We are a total failure
First book signing will be on Saturday
The Front Page
Morning Update
Wednesday, September 29, 2021
By Ken Tingley
Daniel Sherrell is an activist and organizer who is credited with leading the campaign to pass climate legislation in New York.
He is 31 years old and has just written his first book.
Yeah, it is about climate change, but not the “just the facts” kind of book you would get from a lobbyist. This one is more personal.
Sherrell was appearing at the Albany Book Festival at the University at Albany on Saturday. I wasn’t necessarily in the market for a book on climate change, but I was curious about what he had to say on the subject.
His book is not so much how we solve the problem, but how it feels when you are 31 years old and facing a future that will be much different than all past generations. One reviewer described it this way, “Sherrell lays bare how the crisis is transforming our relationships to time, to hope, and to each other. (His book) goes to the heart of the defining question of our time: How do we go on in a world that may not?”
We all should stop and read that last part again. That is what we are talking about now. It also goes to the heart of why my generation does not feel the the urgency when it comes to climate change. After all, we won’t face the brunt of it. We shrug our shoulders.
Sherrell is six years older than my son. When my son and I have talked deep into the night about politics and world problems, I have found him to be at times pessimistic about the future of his world and his place in it.
At times, I have been too dismissive of that viewpoint, chalking it up to youthful insecurities, or perhaps, a world where social media and the Internet have given us too much information.
More than once, I’ve asked friends of his if they feel the same way about the future. They concur, and explain it is not just about climate change, but wealth inequality, a broken political system and a fear they will never be able to make a living or have the same security as their parents. Bringing children into the world seems like a bad idea.
What Sherrell in his book is to write a letter as a father to a hypothetical future child about a world that is unrecognizable to us today. He is writing a letter into the future. Perhaps, he wants to be clear to his future child what he tried to do, how he lived his own live so as not to contribute to the problem. Or maybe he is hoping that the future generation won’t blame him for bringing them into the world.
Writing about our children can be powerful experience. I’ve done it repeatedly over the past 25 years and many of those essays have landed in my first book “The Last American Editor.” Reading them years and years later, I still tear up because the relationship between father and son is so powerful.
I personally came to the climate change debate a little late. It was Al Gore’s documentary “An Inconvenient Truth” that was my “Holy Shit” moment in 2006. When I wrote about it at the time, many of my readers laughed at me. And they laughed at Gore, even as he was landing the Nobel Peace Prize for his work on climate change education.
Looking back, I am guilty of not being more aggressive on our newspaper coverage of climate change. It was such a political issue then - maybe it still is - you were often accused of being liberal just for bringing up the issue.
As late as 2014, when Rep. Elise Stefanik first ran for Congress, she refused to take a stand one way or another, saying “I’m not a scientist.”
Now that she has a child, she may someday have to explain that answer and some of her congressional votes.
As Sherrell talked about his book and climate change Saturday, I couldn’t help but wonder if this young man was as pessimistic as my own son about the future.
During the Q&A, I explained to him that I had a 25-year-old son and that I had found that he and his friends were often pessimistic about the future of the world. I asked him if he felt the same way.
He confirmed he had many of the same concerns.
Earlier that morning he had said he had “hope,” but then explained.
“Hope is not the same thing as optimism,” Sherrell said. “On the current trajectory, things are looking very, very bad. But I don’t know how it will play out.”
What was clear to me and should be clear to all of us by now is that no decision should be made with it making a contribution to fighting climate change.
“This is a crucible,” Sherrell said.
He was right. I felt guilty for not doing more in the past and for shrugging my shoulders too often today. I am worried about what my son will face when he is my age, if he and his friends make it to my age.
Write Congress
At the end of Sherrell’s presentation, he asked how many in the audience were represented in Congress by Rep. Paul Tonko. Most in the audience raised their hands. Sherrell urged all of them to contact Tonko’s office to encourage him to continue the fight for more climate change measures.
A local radio personality spoke up from the back of the room, “I’m represented by Rep. Elise Stefanik,” the man said. “So what do I do there.”
Everyone in the room laughed.
“Well, I guess there is only so much you can do,” said Sherrell.
Layden connection
Emily Layden was also at the festival to discuss her book “All Girls.” It is a coming-of-age story set in a New England boarding school. Layden knows her material having taught at several private boarding schools, including Emma Willard in Troy.
Emily is the daughter of Joe Layden, former sports editor at the Times-Union and a successful ghost writer of celebrity biographies, and niece of Tim Layden, retired Sports Illustrated writer who still works for NBC sports. Both Joe and Tim grew up in Whitehall.
Tim’s daughter Kristen is making her way in Hollywood these days. She is an executive producer for the Apple TV show “The Morning Show.” She is also working on a script for another project, according to Tim.
Apparently, the writing bug has stayed in the family.
Book signing
For all of you who have asked me how you can get your book signed, your first opportunity is coming up Saturday.
I will be signing books at the Book Warehouse at The Outlets in Queensbury from 1 to 3 p.m. on Saturday.
You can buy the book there if you don’t have it yet.
