David Bereson author of Dig Deep — Tales from the depths has begun a new series of stories to be published first on InsideLives before being later formed into an edited collection and published by Franklin Street Press.
Madeline was a lovely woman living in the pristine French alps. It was there she met and fell madly in love with a boy from Melbourne, a close mate of mine. I rode their predicament with them — so far lucky her. But here her fate turns as she decides to move to Melbourne and its less pristine climate. A life of joy starts to turn sour in Melbourne. Madelaine began to experience the disabling effects of hay fever, not something she’d had before. It got worse and the periods of disability became extended due, I’m convinced, to the consequences of climate change. Now she was at the pointy end. Previously it global warming was an abstract notion. To deal with the fever she took more and more drugs, went to see an ENT specialist, tried everything. But all this didn’t offer a solution. She was tied to Melbourne, her lover was there. Eventually she had an allergic reaction and was hospitalised. Her only solution was to move. Climate nomads they became. They realised there was no combatting this awful reality. When all is said and done their only solution was to become activists or to find somewhere else to live — the French alps, perhaps? Climate change unsettles and unhinges all our lives. Sadly we have to find a way to accommodate it. Their solution seems to me to be the rational consequence or we all become climate nomads with nowhere to go.