Living in a Dying World

I remember the first time I went to Yosemite National Park. The trees were so tall I felt as if they touched the sky. The pines were lush with pine needles and they littered beautiful big pine cones on the forest floor. The sequoias were intimidating in size and majesty, and I could feel the energy of our earth humming through the trunks as if it were a silent song they all sang as one.

And then when I was older, we moved to the mountains, only twenty minutes away from the national park I had fallen in love with as a younger girl. But the trees were more bare in that forest than I remembered. The plants more brittle. And as the years went by, my home seemed to become more and more barren. I'd watch airplanes fly over us, every one of them letting out a cloud of white behind them for miles. And I remembered thinking so often: I've seen plenty of airplanes fly without that cloud of exhaust behind them. And so I learned about chem-trails.

And as I grow older I watch more and more of the world get thrown into natural chaos. Our air is toxic, our ocean is slowly creeping up to drown us as the ice caps melt. Animals are disappearing from our world each and every day, the rain forest shrinks, our oceans are dying and I can help but wonder why?

Why are humans acting as if living on Mars is possible? Why are there not more people doing something to stop the destruction? Why are they still burning and cutting the rain forest? Why are there earthquakes in Tennessee now? Why are the oceans still being over fished? Why is the fact that our seasons are just as confused as our sick bodies not raising alarm with anyone who could make a difference? Why is our president reversing as many environmental efforts that the last president made to help our world as he can?

Because here is the hard truth. If our icecaps melt, we will be under water. If our rain forest disappears, the air we breathe will kill us. If our oceans continue to be poisoned, they will die. And if our oceans die, our air becomes toxic, and people will starve, and the rain will burn our skin like acid.

It's not myth. It's not legend. It is science. And it is happening. And to be quite honest with you - even if living on Mars is possible, I would never want to ever live there. I would miss the blue of the sky and the blue-green of the ocean, I would miss the emerald of the trees and the grass. I would crave the emerald, ruby, and sapphire of the flowers that paint and color our world.

Our world is beautiful. Our world is our home. And if we destroy it, we will never have another. So I am calling out to anyone who will hear, to any one who will listen: Please open your eyes, and see the truth. You have so many scientists with the answers, you have so many people willing to help. Repairing and reducing the damage that humans do as a collective on this world is not impossible.

I call to the leaders of not just my country, the United States, but I call to the leaders of the entire world and I am asking you what could possible be more important than making our world a better place for our children? Is it money? Is it the effort it would take? Is it the process and the cost of what it would take?

I am not a scientist. I am not a politician. I am just a citizen, a person who loves her home. A person that is willing to help if the actions were made accessible to me. I am a mother, who wants her daughter to grow up in a world with flowers, and animals, and trees, and fresh clean air. I am a mother who wants ALL children to grow up in a world where water is clean and safe to drink, and nature is available to them to play and run wild in.

So I am calling our leaders to action. Take action. Speak to the scientists, listen to our cries.Spend the extra money and time to FIGHT to make a major change in the way that our world operates so that we may continue to have fish in our oceans and an Ozone layer to protect us from the sun. Listen to the facts, and set an example. Because if you as our leaders cannot do so, then I fear our wold is doomed. I ask you to show me your strength - and discard whatever greed or fear that may be holding you back from making better choices for our earth and our people. Because one mom who obsessively recycles is just is not enough. We need everyone. We need our leaders to pave the way.