Climate Anxiety Rx: Go Local

Pre-traumatic stress disorder: A condition that can develop when someone anticipates a potentially devastating event.

If you care about the climate crisis and what the United States is doing to fight it, the result of this year’s election might feel like a gut punch. I woke up November 6 with a serious case of the gloomy-doomies. By the time the holidays rolled around and I was writing Christmas cards, I felt like dropping the “Happy” in Happy New Year. It just felt tone deaf.

I sort of wanted to write a disclaimer:

“Happy New Year”*

*Unless you died in a fire, hurricane, or from a waterborne disease due to warming temperatures. (But that didn’t quite ring in the holiday spirit.)

Or “Happy New Year”*

*Unless you helped orchestrate Project 2025 whose goal is to dismantle the EPA and reverse the hard-fought environmental protections of the past several decades. In which case I won’t say in print what kind of New Year you can have.

Or “Happy New Year”*

*Unless you follow climate news. In which case I apologize for presuming this New Year will be happy.

However you put it, the past year will go down as the hottest in modern history. We’re experiencing record-breaking heatwaves, water shortages and fires burning as far north as the Arctic tundra. When Beyoncé and Jay-Z have to flee their $190 million mansion in a Malibu fire, you know the situation is dire.

Despite the evidence, Trump has dismissed the threat of climate change, disparages climate science and is expected to withdraw from the Paris Agreement. Again.

The incoming administration’s potential policies to roll back climate policy and encourage more drilling for oil would add 4 billion tons of greenhouse gas emissions to the atmosphere, according to a study by the climate analysis site Carbon Brief.

While this might look like the perfect time to throw up our hands and call it a day, we can take our energy local. Just as a lot of national environmental organizations are refocusing their energy to get things done regionally, there’s plenty we can do locally to draw down climate emissions and protect the beautiful place where we live.

There’s no shortage of organizations that are doing important work right here on the East End. Counting sea birds, planting eel grass or going on an owl hunt under the full moon can be the perfect antidote to climate anxiety.

Climate scientists have called learning about your natural surroundings one of the best ways to fight climate change. If that’s true, South Fork Natural History Museum is ground zero for protecting the environment. Plus, most of its 250 programs involve natural landscapes and scenic views.

Join SOFO on January 18 to take part in the New York State Ornithological Association Winter Waterfowl Count. Due to habitat loss, food scarcity and nonnative species, our wintering population of waterfowl is slowly diminishing. Help record the number of overwintering waterfowl to send to the New York DEC so that they can create legislation to protect bird habitat.

Never picked up binoculars? Join SOFO’s Birding for Beginners and learn how to identify local birds.

Become a citizen scientist on a Seal Cruise and help photograph and gather information about the diversity of the seals in Shinnecock Bay.

Take a hike at sunset and listen for the screech of great horned owls on an Owl Prowl, or join a night expedition in search of native blue-spotted salamanders, which come up only in winter to return to their ancestral ponds.

For the junior climate activist, join SOFO’s Young Environmentalists Society, where young people explore ways to protect our environment. Learn about things like aquaculture, water conservation and local ecology. Visit farms and shellfish hatcheries. Go clamming in Lake Montauk or visit the Riverhead Foundation Marine Rescue facility. Older members learn about environmental careers.

Get social with the Surfrider Foundation. This very active group of local activists works hard to help protect our waters. People tend to think they’re all about beach cleanups, but they do so much more. They’re advocating for things like a moratorium on offshore drilling, stewarding marine protected areas and fighting plastic pollution. Volunteers do water quality testing to make sure our water is safe, as well as create ocean-friendly gardens that sequester carbon and reduce water pollution.

“Even with our beach cleanups, they’re not just picking up litter,” said Christine Capelli, the vice president of the Eastern Long Island chapter. “We’re sorting and cataloging it to find out where the problem is and help to advocate for legislation to reduce plastic waste.”

Another local way to advocate for the planet is to attend a town board meeting and speak up for environmental policy. Climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe reminds us that 99.9 percent of elected officials serve locally at the county and state level, not federal.

This winter, if you live in Southampton, the town will be taking up a critical proposal to close its sand mines. Despite zoning prohibiting sand mining in vulnerable water supply areas, several mines have remained active for decades, risking contamination of the underlying aquifer. Bob DeLuca of Group for the East End said, “A lot of people are intimidated by town board meetings because they think you have to know the technical details, when really, all you have to do is show up and say you care about clean water. Legislators just need to be reminded.”

Heading into the woods, or what the Japanese call “forest bathing,” is not just good for the soul, but also a place where people are doing good things for the land. I joined the East Hampton Trail Preservation Society last Saturday morning and had fun discovering new trails, meeting some nice people and learning to leave the trail better off for all hikers. The Southampton Trails Preservation Society also leads hikes and maintains over 300 miles of trails in Southampton alone. The more people enjoy our beautiful open spaces, the more we can help preserve them.

For a whole different perspective, hike through a field of stars on the monthly full moon hike with Friends of Long Pond Greenbelt. Look for owls. Listen for warblers and peeper frogs emerging in the spring. By day, join their volunteer group to maintain the trails inside a six-mile-long expanse of interconnected ponds, woods and wetlands. Discover its wildflowers, native grasslands, reptiles, butterflies and over 100 species of meadow-loving birds.

Stargazing isn’t exactly a top 10 solution to fighting climate change, but it reminds us of our place in the universe and that stars will be shining eternities longer than Elon Musk’s Starlink satellites. Join the Hamptons Observatory for stargazing parties, portable planetarium shows and astronomy lectures. Learning ways to preserve dark skies is important for animals, insects, reducing energy and our own health.

In this darkest of months, I’m not assuming anyone’s new year will be happy. But we ourselves can work to make it so. Go local. Join a group. Find peace. And of course, have a Happy New Year!

Ways To Go Local:

Surfrider Foundation (surfrider.org): Beach cleanups and ocean-friendly gardening pick up again in March and April. Members meet every third Thursday monthly. Join them in Albany in late January with their partner Beyond Plastics to lobby for bills to end single-use plastic packaging.

South Fork Natural History Museum (sofo.org): Offers 250 programs year round. For the Young Environmentalists Society (Ages 5 to 9 and 10 to 16), stay tuned for the next meeting and a screening of kid-produced short environmental films. For more information call 631-537-9735.

Hamptons Observatory (hamptonsobservatory.org): Join author Dava Sobel for a lecture about her new book, “The Elements of Marie Curie: How the Glow of Radium Lit a Path for Women in Science” on Monday January 13, 6 p.m. at Southampton Arts Center, 25 Jobs Lane, Southampton. Guided night sky tour follows at 7:30 p.m.

Friends of the Long Pond Greenbelt (longpondgreenbelt.org): Volunteer to maintain trails in a six-mile-long expanse of interconnected ponds, woods and wetlands. Join birding events. Also offered are winter full moon hikes through Vineyard Field’s open-field trails followed by light refreshments on January 13, February 12, March 14. To register email: greenbeltnews@aol.com.

East Hampton Trails Preservation Society (easthamptontrailspreservationsociety.org): Free year-round guided hikes on diverse trails throughout East Hampton, Montauk and beyond, narrated walks in historic areas of the town. Volunteer for trail maintenance work sessions. Check the activities calendar for dates.

Southampton Trails (southamptontrails.org): Join volunteers to maintain blazed trails and help clear brush. Huge variety of free guided hikes Saturdays and Sundays year round.