We humans have been around in different forms for thousands of years, and in many ways we have improved the way life works here.
But in many ways, we are destroying the very planet we all live on, the very planet we all call home, the only planet in the solar system that we’re currently aware of that we can survive on!
The song of the day is about how big corporations are ruining the earth, and heaven knows they’re doing their share.
NO argument from me on that.
And there’s really not a lot any individual can do to stop them, at least not immediately, and that can lead us to figure “Why even bother?”
Well, I take a different approach.
For the last five or six years – not a lifetime, but we all have to start somewhere – I have been aware of what I put in the trash, what I could recycle, and how these small efforts of mine help even in the smallest way.
I’ve learned that there are many different kinds of plastic, and some can be recycled at our local town’s center, but some can’t be.
But a local big box store has bins where we can toss the thin plastic wraps and the other plastic bags that our town’s recycle center can’t take, so I now make a conscious effort to save all plastic wrap in a plastic bag and drop it off there when I’m in the area.
I may be only one person doing that, although the bins at the store are usually full, but it’s an effort each of us could make.
And having recently taken the job of Managing Editor at the Florida Specifier, a 40+-year-old environmental trade journal that is all about ways to mitigate and/or reverse the damage we humans are doing, I have found even more ways and reasons to be careful in my own life.
I read recently of a company that is taking the plastic waste from the oceans and creating clothing from it … surely far better than letting it be ingested by marine animals, right? And if you Google the words “clothes from recycled plastic,” you’ll see dozens and dozens more, all taking the waste and remaking it into usable items.
Of course, most of us aren’t going to start companies to do such inventive things, but we can all do something!
So my question is simple:
What are YOU doing to help our planet?
What measures have YOU taken in the last few years that are helping or will help our small blue planet stay habitable for thousands of years to come?
Great to know, Eva Marie!
Excellent news, Eva Marie! If everyone did a little more, it sure would help!
Great question we all can make a difference one person at a time. I recycle cardboard and pop bottles. In out state each bottle is worth 5 cents to encourage people to turn them back in and not litter. Being conscious if what we are doing with our waste can make a difference. Great articke