"Reply hazy, try again."

We're literally trying to see through a smokescreen.

Like cycles of sun and cloud it’s been off and on for the past few weeks, but weather has been a newsworthy subject around these parts. I couldn’t tell you all the meteorological ins and outs of why this is going on, but whatever is burning in Canada or New Jersey or wherever is making it seem perpetually cloudy all day around here. Blood-orange sunrises and sunsets are interesting the first time, but all this is getting old - especially when we’re seeing the postponement and cancellation of outdoor events. You know it’s serious to me when my Tigers are postponed.

Of course, if you go to the mainstream media for an explanation, they’ll blame climate change, people overbuilding, blah blah blah. Apparently the eastern part of Canada did have an unusally dry and warm spring this year, and lightning strikes from the storms that usually provide relief are to blame for starting these particular fires. (Come to think of it, we’ve had a sort of unusual spring here in that very little severe weather has affected us.) But somewhere along the line, we’ll get one of those patented stationary fronts that just seem to stall out right over this part of the Delmarva, bringing a few days of humidity and pop-up storms and creating the conditions that finally are corrected by a strong cold front. (That is, as long as that front is not bringing in smoke from somewhere else in Canada.)

I’ve been on this earth long enough that I know weather can be cyclical. The frigid winters that brought our half of the U.S. a blizzard seemingly every year in the late 1970s have eventually been balanced by the more temperate winters like we had this past winter, when we literally had a trace of snow all winter. (I wonder what the local radio station did with its “predict the date of the first inch of snow” contest, unless they drew the winner from the people who predicted “not this winter.”) It’s obviously more apparent in the winter, but having been here nearly twenty years I’ve enjoyed a few snowless winters and cussed out a few foot-deep snowstorms, too. It was probably the same way back when the Nanticoke Indians were the inhabitants of this part of our sandbar.

But for the next few days around here we’ll smell the trace of smoke and looking out my window it will look like a big rainstorm is coming. We’ll get through it, though. Maybe I feel this way because I work for an entity that’s among the “toxic 10” climate deniers (this report is a hoot, and we should be proud of being included) but I have faith in Mother Nature to clean things up. She always does.