The cat’s been under the weather for the past few days—sleeping a lot, acting a bit lethargic, not wanting to go out as much as usual. It wouldn’t have seemed like such a panic situation, but this was the same cat who was poisoned a few months ago by ingesting second hand d-Con. The country vet noted that Caine had a fever, but was encouraged that his body was fighting off whatever kitty-virus he’d picked up.

An analogy can be made here with human beings, of course in the role of the virus and the Earth as the hearty body with a strong urge to survive trying to fight us off. As tempting as it is to chalk this epoch off as one big human screw-up—sit back and watch the fireworks, so to speak—we owe it to the Earth to give way and allow her every advantage in her effort to shake off the disease that’s got her down.

While it might be hard to swallow that humans will eventually do the right thing, it would be hasty to underestimate the self-healing powers of our planet herself. All we’d need to do is quit adding to the problem by bringing more humans mouths into the fray and change our hedonistic, carnivistic ways. Otherwise, the Earth will inevitably rear up and scream, “Enough!” Life on Earth has survived more adversity than we can dish out. The question is, do humans want to still be a part of the living planet once the Earth is through with her healing?