Global warning

We went to see Al Gore's film An Inconvenient Truth when we were in London last year and I was really shocked by its predictions, especially as I had considered myself well-informed on the issues. Ever since then I have been seeing things which seem to confirm he is absolutely right.

For example, I can't remember ever hearing birds singing in January before - isn't it normally the end of February or March before you hear them again? The olive trees in our yard already have new green leaves complete with beastly caterpillars munching on them. And all the rain and wind we have had this month - repeated gales which have only happened maybe once a winter, if that.

I know some people claim that global warming has been blown out of proportion and that the weather has always been erratic, but I really do wonder. Some friends of ours bought a house with a stream running through the grounds. They knew it sometimes flooded in winter but now the Environment Agency have told them that due to rising water levels, they will soon have part of that field permanently underwater.

I can't help wondering whether people deny what may be happening because they simply can't believe things can change so much and so quickly. We have the privilege of living somewhere that has been temperate and stable for so long. Maybe we just lack the imagination to see it may not always be that way. It always happens to someone else, doesn't it?