Wildfires: The one thing that can be said is: Nova Scotia can do disaster

It has been a week, Nova Scotia.

The wildfires have taken the wind out of our sails just to feed their own flames.

Not since the early days of the pandemic have there been such high levels of collective preoccupation.

Where Nova Scotian sighs marked conversation breaks, there’s now wandering unseeing eyes, nervous and full of concern.

It has been terrifying. As Nova Scotians, we are adjusted to some level of destruction from hurricanes.

With hurricanes you prepare. You brace for impact. And wake up the next day ready to clean up.

The wildfires just appeared. We’ve just had to watch. And they continue.

Helplessness is not something we are adjusted to.

I am an optimist to a fault. As someone who thrives off gallows humour, I annoy myself by always being able to find the bright side.

But how do you find a bright side of blinding flames whose wrath can be seen from space?

You can’t. There is no bright side.

There is no hidden benefit. Of course, there’s concentrating on those who are helping to keep our spirits up. They are doing good. And good is good. Firefighters, first responders, kind and gentle folk heading into the flames for our pets and everyone doing what they can to support them and the displaced are good.

But the people doing good are still us. Shocked and anxious. They might be too busy to show it right now.

The one thing that can be said is: Nova Scotia can do disaster.

Our shores have seen thousands of shipwrecks. Many times Mi’gmaq and Nova Scotians have done what they can to help the helpless in the water and find a place for the survivors to go. And we did.

Planes have gone down, a terrifying and devastating sight. Victims needed to be recovered. And we did.

When Halifax exploded annihilating our capital city and changing the landscape forever we needed to respond to the injured, find a place for the displaced and clean up the wreckage. And we did.

Nova Scotia is built on disasters happening on our land to new Nova Scotian’s fleeing their own.

Right now we are in the active stage of disaster.

It is uncomfortable, saddening, upsetting and unforgettable.

It’s okay to be occupied with watching the news. It’s okay to be scared. It’s okay that there’s nothing most of us can do.

Because there will be. And we will.

We will rebuild the houses. We will do our best to restore the ancestral lands of the south.

Where items will be replaced with heartache and grief becoming legends to tell.

Mi’gma’gi and Nova Scotia will rise again with the scars of what was.

We will learn from this and move forward from this.

But for now, it is fine to despair at the orange skies. The scorched earth.

The loss.

But I promise you.

The skies will be blue again.