By
Lorraine Glowczak
The
warm sunny weather we’ve been experiencing the past few days has put a spring
back in my step and I’m loving every minute of it. Although I do receive snow
with open arms during the wintertime of the year, I’m just as happy to see it
go as we head fully into March.
However,
as the snow gently recedes and melts away, it slowly exposes the trash in the
ditches along
I
was six years old in 1971 when Keep America Beautiful, Inc. produced its
anti-pollution campaign. It was probably the best-known and most guilt-inducing
public service announcement at the time. It’s the
commercial staring actor, Iron Eyes Cody as a Native American shedding a single
tear at the sight of a trash-filled and smoke laden landscape.
The words in the ad go something like this: “Some people
have a deep, abiding respect for the natural beauty that was once
this country and some people don’t,” states a narrator in a baritone voice.
Apocalyptic
music follows as someone tosses a bag of half-eaten fast food out the window of
a passing car. It lands and scatters at the actor’s feet. He looks forlorn into
the camera as the tear rolls down his cheek. The narrator continues, “People
start pollution. People can stop it.”
Without
a doubt, this commercial made a massive impact on my six-year-old psyche and I
became an environmental activist – well – at least for an hour after I saw the
ad and until something else caught my attention. Eventually the commercial
stopped running and although I never became an activist in the traditional sense,
you will never catch me throwing trash out the window of my car. That tear
really made its mark on me. But more accurately, I do love the natural
environment that Maine has to offer, and I would like to preserve it as best as
I can.
In
about one month - on Wednesday, April 22, we celebrate the 50th anniversary of
Earth Day. Whether you have been deemed an official “tree hugger” or not, we
all have a certain responsibility to the environment if we wish to maintain the
life we have now.
It
really does not matter whether you are a conservationist, or you simply enjoy
the Maine outdoors, it behooves us all to assume a certain obligation to not
mess up our own back yards. Our actions do not have to be big, profound, or
impressive (but if they are, contact us and we’ll write about you!).They can be
simple everyday actions that work within our everyday lives.
One
small action I have done in the past happened during my morning walks. I took a
trash bag with me and pick up garbage thrown along the side of the road. I would
have to stop every two or three seconds, and the trash bag was completely full
in less than a ¼ of a mile.
Just
as I was beginning to feel I was making a difference; I would then notice more
trash reappear after a couple of days of having not walked. This brought back
my memory of “the lone tear.”
Although
it seems I’m trying to save the Earth, that’s really not what I’m doing at all.
I’m selfishly saving my own butt and the way I have become accustomed to the
joys of being in nature.
If
there is any truth that the planet is a self-correcting system then it would
seem that the earth, in all its natural intelligence, will adjust just fine. Humans,
however, don’t adjust so well. We love things to remain the same and we fight
change with all our might.
Whether
it’s four-wheelin’ in the countryside you enjoy or a nice meditative stroll through
a forest path – we all want the same thing – for the beauty of nature and all
it has to offer to remain as we know it.
Comedian
George Carlin once said that the planet itself will be just fine. It will just
“shake us off like a bad case of fleas” to free itself from the object causing
its pain. I don’t know about you, but I’m not ready to be shook off the planet
just yet.
So,
this may be selfish (again) on my part, but would anyone out there be
interested in joining me in self-correcting trash habit behaviors? Here’s the
deal. Starting today, I will stop buying plastic coffee to-go cups. If you see
me with one, I will owe you coffee.
If
you join me, then perhaps next spring when the snow melts yet again…the
roadways will have less trash. And perhaps, somewhere, someplace, somehow.....there will be less tears…less fleas.
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