It is another cross quarter day…and a fine one here in my small Georgia garden.

We are halfway between the fall equinox when day and night were the same length…and the dark time of the winter solstice.

I have been blessed to have a migrating Monarch linger here for several days, enjoying the salvias & camellias particularly.

My mind is on the election…& being the natural science nerd I am, I have listened for what is said…or more to the point, not said…about our way forward regarding the environment…and while I have never, ever before endorsed a candidate, this is an election & a time like no other in my brief 62 years on this earth.

While we humans obsess about Hillary’s emails and Donald’s antics,  the other species we share this planet with are becoming extinct at an unprecedented rate.  Scientists are referring to this as the sixth extinction….the fifth took out the dinosaurs.  This era in geological time has been dubbed the Anthropocene…meaning “the human age”…because for the first time, it is human activity that is driving changes in geology and ecosystems.

In this election cycle…if we are to move forward in the ways we must, to ensure  our children’s futures if not our own…I have to believe our best hope lies with Democrats.

The Democratic radar is tuned into things like…

…job creation in renewable energy
…the regulation of toxic chemicals & land use that we need to stem such things as…
…the extinction of bees and monarchs…
…and the spoiling of lakes…from those of my family’s beloved Minnesota which were clogged with lurid green algae when I flew over them last summer…to the slimy disaster that was Lake Okeechobee in Florida this summer.

With a few rare exceptions, the environment is not on the Republican radar.  In that world, at this point in time, science is viewed with suspicion, regulation is demonized until something like lead in Flint water happens & fingers wag, climate change is a hoax, and the endangered species act is under attack.

I will climb down from my soap box now.  But for anyone still undecided…do consider Mother Nature when you venture into that voting booth.