Thoughts on This Earth Day

It turns out that, if everyone on the planet lived as wastefully and carelessly as Americans, we would need 3 Earth's to sustain us. 3 Planet Earth's to sustain us. Can you believe it? At first I couldn't. Then I reminded myself that not everyone recycles and reuses the way my family does. We recycle what we can in our area: tin cans, aluminum and #1 and #2 plastics. We compost all of our fresh stuff, which is quite a lot, and we have zillions of things around here being reused. For instance, meat trays become pet food dishes. Plastic water bottles get refilled and reused many times before they're finally recycled. And all those plastic bags? We use them to pack lunches in, to double wrap frozen items and to line small trash cans. All simple, easy, cheap things to do. And yet, so much of this country won't even consider it.

It's either too much work for their lazy asses or too much of a mess for their pristine hands. These are probably the same people who don't like to garden because it's dirty. Even if one doesn't accept global warming as an issue don't you think it would still make sense to conserve our resources and minimize waste? Ya' know, waste not want not and all that? I guess I shouldn't complain too much, after all, the number of people making a sincere effort today is far greater than on the first Earth Day back in 1970. The word has been spreading and now it's become almost "politically correct" (whatever the hell that means) to be conservative-with our natural resources that is. Automakers are finally starting to take things seriously as are policymakers. Some people have the opportunity to go even greener than us. Hybrid cars, solar panels, fuel from corn and a myriad of other ways to go green. It is happening, but I fear not fast enough. I hate to be a downer but what if it's too little too late? What if the fatal damage has already been done? On the off-chance that it has consider our space program and its possible goals for the future: Did you know that the largest of Saturn's moons, by the name of Titan, has enough natural gas in its lakes to power the Earth for 50 million years? We probably couldn't ever live there as there is no oxygen, but it's nice to know about the fuel isn't it? So, even if we totally ruin this planet, there's hope out there.