An Earth Day Moment

Yesterday was Earth Day.  What does that mean to each of us?  Does it mean that for the day, you decided to recycle or read something on the history of Earth Day?  Does it mean that you said “Happy Earth Day” to a few people and took the bus to work? Or maybe, will you took a long hard look at what our relationship with Mother Earth looks like and figured out some way that you can routinely change your lifestyle so that every day you are contributing to bettering our planet?

Celebrating the Earth’s existence is one of the most fantastic things that we can do.  Unfortunately it has to happen more than one time a year.  It has to be in our heads every single day.  In the morning…  “I have my keys, I have my bag, did I turn off every light in my house and unplug all unnecessary items that don’t need to be plugged in?”   At lunch…. “Do I have to drive to lunch?  Is there a restaurant that uses biodegradable to go wear?  The dry cleaning is from a company that uses eco-friendly chemicals.”  After work…. “Do I have to go when there is so much traffic I’m just going to sit in my car while it’s running?  Are the ingredients for dinner coming from sustainable locations?”  And so on. 

I know it’s difficult and I will be honest; I don’t think like this but maybe 30 percent of the time, but we have to work on making this a reflex.  If we want any future as a race on this planet, then we have to.  Especially on a week that gas is at the highest price it has ever been in our country ever.  If you’re not aware, the price for crude oil topped at $112 yesterday.  This is also after a year where BP had record profits in the same year as the Gulf oil spill.    But I digress.   This is an Earth Day celebration and my point is we all have to make an individual effort.  While we’re doing that, I hope the best to all of you as w, me included, continue to find the pennies in the cushions to fill our gas tanks.   

Here is what I saw while I was in Baltimore.  A free bus that covers the greater Baltimore area that runs every ten minutes for majority of the day.  It is being used, taken care of and greatly appreciated by the residence of Baltimore.