Mom Goes Green

This comment would NEVER come from me… but I’ve heard it (at least 20 times from family and friends over the past three months).

Each time I want to scream.  I desperately want to get in arguments and pull out all the facts.  My husband pleads with me to “let it go” and brings me down to (our undeniably snowy) earth.  But I do have to share the reality with them….

I understand how this is a quick, easy argument from anyone who doesn’t believe in global warming or climate change.  It seems logical, but it’s not supported by science.  The fact:  hotter air can hold more moisture and this, in turn, creates and releases massive amounts of snow when the temperatures are below freezing. This is the same reason hurricanes have become so destructive… warming waters, rising sea levels and an increase in the intensity of the storm.

We could all argue the point until we’re blue in the face (and yes, the naysayers would tell you you’re turning blue because you’re freezing your a$$ off!) but the evidence of the earth’s temperature rising is factual. It’s on record. The 11 warmest years on record have occurred in the last 13 (and that record dates back to 1880!)

We can debate (until we’re BLUER in the face) if a portion of that is caused by human behavior, activity and INaction, but that’s another huge conversation.

Take a look at this quick interview with a physics professor to prepare your defense to family and friends.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Call it global warming, climate change, global swings, whatever… but the fact is undeniable… we’re heatin’ up, baby, and yes, that means lots of snow too!

Let the recovery begin…

I find this absolutely intriguing.  It sounds crazy, yet logical… fundamental, yet brilliant. How interesting that something so organic and natural may be the solution for cleaning up the oil that could potentially devastate the environment.  Imagine if this could really work…? Take a look.

What do you think?

Over the past 39 days I’ve been asked (countless times) my thoughts about the Deepwater/Gulf Oil disaster… I find the situation both infuriating and heartbreaking.  This has become a full-scale environmental disaster and sadly, it is all man-made.

It is now believed that 12,000 barrels of oil are streaming into the Gulf on a daily basis.  There are 100 miles of beaches, marshes, wetlands and barrier islands now being destroyed along the Louisiana coastline and what took nature thousands of years to create is taking no time for man to destroy.  The harm created to the environment and wildlife is staggering and sadly, no amount of clean-up will allow nature to repair itself in our lifetime, or potentially even within our children’s. This is what I find heart-breaking.

What I find infuriating is that in the hour before the explosion, there were three indicators that a failure could actually occur.  All warnings were ignored and resulted in the loss of eleven lives and now the environmental devastation we are hearing about daily.

Even if the oil were stopped today, let’s remember that it took a month for the oil to reach the shore so there is now at least another month’s worth of oil still on its way to make landfall….the destruction will continue to spread.

I could get extremely political with who’s at fault and who should be fixing the problem but it seems to me… umm, BP?… you BUILT it, you KNOW how it works… fix it, stop it… NOW! A private corporation created it, not our government, and only they would have the intense understanding and technology of deep sea drilling.  Am I crazy to believe this?  And now I understand that after creating such a disaster, BP may only be liable for a cap of 75 million dollars of the cost to repair the damage and clean up this mess.  But the damage will never truly be repaired. Sickening.

I, for one, will never patronize a BP for any reason. I understand that all U.S. BPs are franchised and some may say that this will only hurt the business owner but, regardless, they are still supported by BP and I will not give them my money.  There are too many other choices and I will allow myself to run out of gas and walk before I stop at one of their gas stations or stores (my husband already boycotted them recently for charging $1 for air!).

But no matter how large a boycott would become it would be matter of principal alone, because BP is too large and powerful and cannot be destroyed… I only wish I could say the same for our environment.

(*View The Washington Post’s presentation of photos of the environmental disaster and destruction of wildlife)

My love of dolphins has been lifelong. I don’t remember when it started, but I know it has never ended.

I do remember visiting Sea World and coming home with a dolphin mobile that hung over my bed from the time I was 5 until I headed off to college.  There is something dreamy, graceful and mesmerizing about these animals and their extreme intelligence is without question.

So when I heard about the documentary “The Cove” I was caught between that feeling of “I must see this” and “oh, I don’t want to see this…”  Well, I watched it… and it is absolutely haunting.

Richard O’Barry, Louie Psihoyos and their team uncover the killing of these beautiful and intelligent animals in a closely guarded and shielded cove in Taiji, Japan.  Each day, they are driven into the cove where the most visually-appealing dolphins are selected and sold to marine and aquatic parks, and the others are brutally and inhumanely slaughtered for their meat (meat that is passed off as expensive whale meat and sold for a premium price, and because of dolphins’ place in the food chain, contains extraordinary levels of mercury).  Take a look…

There are so many points of this story that just sicken me.  From the capture of these animals to turn them into “entertainers”, to the inhuman killings, to feeding unknowing consumers and school children(!) toxic food… it’s despicable.

As pointed out by the film, the 70′s had a massive movement to “Save the Whales”… now is the time to “Save the Dolphins”…

Please take time to see this documentary.

And if you’re like me and you want to do something, please go to TakePart… and help us make a change and stop the killing…

Yes, summer is dwindling… and as I spend small portions of days preparing to send our kids back to school I keep running across reminders of the vacation that was not so long ago, but seems so long ago.

The drive took us through breathtaking views of West Virginia mountains where we were awed by trees as far as the eye could see.  It was amazing to see so many undisturbed miles without areas cleared away for development.  My views on chopping down trees are no mystery.   Can you just imagine how invigorating the air in the middle of those mountains must be?

I think about our kids running wild over the Jockey’s Ridge sand dunes, the largest active dune system in the Eastern US.  What a difference to those treed mountains… conditions on the dunes are so harsh, vegetation can only grow on the outskirts.  But the sunset… ah, the sunset.   The silhouettes in this photo are actually our precious kids, standing where the top of the dunes (that are believed to have been formed millions of years ago) seem to meet the sky.

And what beach vacation doesn’t include lots of ocean time.  Just the sound relaxes me.  I could watch the waves for hours on end and I get wrapped up in how vast and amazing the ocean is.  The irony is that one of our favorite adventures was trying to find sea glass washed up on the shore.  This sea glass is actually glass that has found its way into the ocean and gets tumbled and smoothed by the water, sand and salt.  Every time we found one it was like finding a real gem and then I start to wonder what it came from, where it originated, who touched it before us and even how it wound up in the ocean.  Yes, ironic that Mom Goes Green and family found treasures in something that started as ocean litter!

The point of all of this is simply that experiencing the mountains, the sprawling dunes and the incredible ocean reminds me of another quote by Divamish Indian Chief Seattle:

“Take only memories, leave nothing but footprints.”

… tread lightly in our daily lives, because this planet is truly amazing!

This weekend our family enjoyed a fabulous day of art and culture at an event called Parade the Circle.  It literally brings art and culture to life when participants create interpretations of famous works of art and their artists through costumes, music and some of the most creative props I have ever seen.

After the parade the activities continued in a large park and we were enjoying the event until I noticed them dismantling the six enormous balloon arches that were used in the parade.  By ones, twos, (SEVENS!), groups of balloons took to the sky… and I simply thought “Oh no.  Someone make them stop!”

I’ve always been leery of balloons for the simple fear of my kids choking on one of them.  But there is also an on-going debate about the environmental effect of balloons, and that is what concerned me with this event.

The balloon industry argues that, because they are made of latex, they biodegrade at the same rate as an oak leaf and have no effect on the environment.  But environmentalists will disagree that the concern isn’t so much about their biodegradability, but the effect they have on animals that mistake them for food and consume them once they burst or come back down to ground.  Animals also become entangled in the strings and ribbons that are still attached.

Studies of marine animals that have beached themselves have turned up digestive systems blocked with deflated or partial deflated balloons, suggesting that they actually beached themselves to get out of their painful misery.  That’s all I need to hear.

While I’m not suggesting that we all swear off  balloons (because my kids would definitely be bummed!) I am suggesting that we take responsibility in just four simple ways:

• Keep balloons indoors
• Never purposely release them into the sky
• When they are outdoors, weight them down to prevent “escape” and
• Detach the strings and simply dispose of them properly when you’re finished with them

Everyone loves a parade and every kid loves a balloon, but what goes up must come down, and it’s a landing that can have a harsh and destructive reality.

The other day I talked about my frustration over seeing an excessive amount of ‘plastic bag trash’ littering one of our favorite Cleveland lakeside parks.

I feel I would be remiss without mentioning the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.  I was honestly surprised by how many of my friends had not heard of it before, but it’s something I cannot stop thinking about.

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is essentially seven million tons of floating plastic waste, roughly twice the size of Texas (and some say, twice the size of the entire US).  It swirls through the ocean between the continental US and Japan, and contains everything from plastic bags to Legos to footballs.  One fifth is believed to come from trash dumped from ships and oil rigs, and the rest comes from land and all of the plastics we discard on a daily basis.

Take a look, and see if you can keep from feeling just a little bit unsettled.

And if you want to know more detail…

The problem is this… the plastics break down into small pieces of debris, pollute the ocean and beaches, disturb the eco-system and literally become food for marine life, because they can’t distinguish between what is “real” food and what is our trash.  In fact, the amount of plastic trash in this area is six times greater than the amount of plankton (this area’s most abundant food source).  This “mistake” costs them their life.  And think about what happens if you consume a fish whose diet consisted primarily of plastics… it makes me shudder.

The next time you think of tossing away some plastics… stop… and “really think”.

(Additional post:  The Great Pacific Garbage Patch: words from its “founder”)

(Additional post:  The Great Pacific Garbage Patch… worse than expected?)

This post was also re-published, with permission, at The Reef Tank.