Earth Life

So, I kind of messed up. I am a lifelong environmentalist and I let Earth Day slip by without so much as a Daily Show clip on my blog. I was aware that Thursday was Earth Day. I consciously minimized my car-use that day, spending most of the day playing with Lilly outside in the yard, i.e. in nature. But for some reason it never occurred to me to write some Earth-related blog. Why?  Um, well, the blog is named mushbrain for a reason.

Now, I am most certainly overestimating my influence in the world by suggesting that this has in any way impacted the environmental movement. But still it was the absolute least I could do and I didn’t do it. So, I’m making an example of myself. Rather than say, “oh well, I missed it. I’ll make sure to do something next Earth Day,” I’m going resolve (again) to observe an Earth Life, rather than an Earth Day.

I’m a list-maker; so I’m going to write 2 lists. The first one (below) is a short list of simple things everyone can do to help ease the human burden on this planet. Since I already try (with varying degrees of success) to include the list below in my daily life, I will challenge myself with a second list – to be posted shortly – of things I intend to do to be a little greener.

5 Easy Ways to Help the Earth (and its Future Generations):

1. Join a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) and get fresh, seasonal food from local producers. Why? It saves the fuel associated with processing, preserving, and transporting out-of-season produce from all over the world and it’s tasty. Find a CSA here.
2. Contact your local representatives and let them know you care about environmental issues. Why? Because big business is telling them just the opposite every day. And if you don’t, who will?
3. Plant something. Why? Trees curb the CO2 in the atmosphere. Homegrown veggies reduce fuel consumption. Flowers, trees and shrubs improve quality of life and the environment.
4. Eat a vegetarian dinner at least once a week. Why? Factory farming is a major source of greenhouse gases, contaminated food and inhumane treatment of animals and workers. (For much more on this, watch Food, Inc.)
5. Include a child in any or all of the above activities. Why? Because children learn by example and there are a lot of bad ones out there.

If you don’t like my suggestions (and that’s all they are), I encourage you to come up with a few green ideas that you do like. And feel free to share them in comments!

The Earth Life by MushBrain, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. Terms and conditions beyond the scope of this license may be available at mushbrain.net.