The Unexpected Outcome Of My Son’s Environmental Anxiety
His fears inspired me to write a book about it.
A couple years ago, as most authors do at some point in their career, I was struggling with what to write next. I had a few half-baked ideas that weren’t quite going anywhere and personally, I was going through a mini mid-life crisis. I have four kids and was in the thick of what that entails (the Mom taxi, the laundry, the endless scrolling of Instagram looking for advice that I’m hoping will be the magic bullet to make life easier). And then of course, there’s my nearly two-decade-old marriage to a man I adore, but sometimes when he snores at night it’s so annoying, I want to put a pillow over his face and hold it there. (I haven’t. I wouldn’t! It’s just a … fantasy.) It reminded me of that old Peggy Lee song: Is That All There Is? I think there comes a point at mid-life and marriage — no matter how much you love your kids and your husband —when you’re sludging through and it feels like there are no surprises left anymore.
And then I was surprised.
My oldest son Henry, who was 11 at the time, has always been worldly and bright and a little mature for his age. He read The Week Jr. cover to cover every week, knew more about geopolitics than most adults and often stumped me with questions about the world. He also had loved animals from a young age and could spout off many facts about them from his years of watching Wild Kratts and National Geographic specials. He’d known about climate change and its impact for a long time, but that year, it began to solidify for him—just how dire the future could be, if governments and adults across the globe didn’t start to make it a priority and act. And why weren’t they acting? He couldn’t understand it and I didn’t have good answers for him. He began to really struggle with what I now know is termed “environmental anxiety,” and that 37% of teens suffer from it, let’s get a link for this according to a recent survey. He became obsessed with the idea that humans were killing the earth and the animals and the air we breathe, and he was bewildered, devastated, and angry. One day, he walked into the kitchen and said: “Mom, I know the answer. I think we should just blow up the entire earth! Everyone would die and then nature would take back over. We don’t deserve it.”
I stared at him, unblinking, with a hand to my heart. My precious, sensitive son had just suggested such a violent resolution—and so passionately! I was shocked. I couldn’t remember the last time I was that passionate about anything. And then I thought: What a great book idea.
His comment struck to the heart of what I’d been feeling — I was so buried in the mundanity of daily life as a mom and felt like I’d lost a part of myself — the part who used to fervidly care about things like environmental justice. Where did she go? Would I get her back? Is that kind of unbridled concern and passion just a season of life, a torch we pass down to the next generation from beneath the piles of laundry? Here, kid. I’m busy. Can you fix this climate change thing?
I laughed. I cried. I hugged my son. (Don’t worry! I also immediately called a therapist for Henry and he’s now a well-adjusted, kind, and peaceful 14-year-old, who’s passionate about recycling, but not about eco-terrorism).
And then I got to work.
Jane and Dan at the End of the World is my satirical exploration of all those questions I had and more. Jane, a woman in her mid-40s, a harried mother, a failed author, a disenchanted wife, who barely has the will to make it to the grocery store, is out to dinner with her husband Dan for their 19th wedding anniversary when they’re suddenly taken hostage by an eco-activist group hellbent on saving the world. Jane is shocked — and not just because she’s in a hostage situation the likes of which she’s only seen in the movies. Nearly everything the disorganized and bumbling activists say and do is right out of the pages of her failed book. Even Dan (who Jane wasn’t sure even read her book) admits it’s eerily familiar. Which means Dan and Jane are the only ones who know what’s going to happen next. And they’re the only ones who can stop it.
I hope it makes readers laugh. I hope if you’re a mid-life married mom like me, you see yourself in the pages of this book. I hope it makes my son proud. But most importantly, I really hope he figures out how to fix this climate change thing. I have found zero solutions on Instagram.
Colleen Oakley is the USA Today bestselling author of The Mostly True Story of Tanner & Louise, The Invisible Husband of Frick Island, You Were There Too, Close Enough to Touch, and Before I Go. Her books have been translated into more than twenty languages around the world and have won multiple awards including Georgia Author of the Year and the French Reader’s Prize. A former magazine editor for Women’s Health & Fitness and Marie Claire, Colleen lives in Atlanta with her husband, four children, three chickens, and a mutt named Baxter.
