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I like to think I do my part for the environment, or at the very least, try to remain in a state of internal green balance. I have one friend that was arrested for sneaking into the Democratic Convention wearing a trench coat, capital dome bra, and American stripes short-shorts with dollar bills tucked into her garter, her way of sounding off about Campaign Finance Reform. I was also stuck on the Golden Gate Bridge the day Woody Harrelson climbed to the top to hang his banner about saving the Redwoods. I later flirted with an invitation via the capital dome activist friend to go hot-tubbing with environmentalists, Paul Hawken, and Rainforest Action Network founder, Randy Hayes. Yet all during this time in my twenties, none of the above causes pushed me toward a greener life.
Now in my thirties, I take action. The other day, I called Majority Leader Reid in Nevada (who I had never even heard of) to urge amendments to the current Farm Bill in Congress since Food and Water Watch informed me by email of the health safety concerns in the current farm industry. I chose to live the city life without a car, but then inherited a twenty-year-old van with a rebuilt engine. By donating to NRDC, I justify burning the van’s fuel. Who could ignore Robert Redford’s email campaign to save the polar bears slipping off those ice slabs in the Artic? Yesterday, I flashed a smile to the Greenpeace volunteer outside my office building when he tried to woo me with his self-composed Greenpeace “rap.” I told him about my monogamy with NRDC, and then to avoid further entanglement, I left him with a question to ponder: maybe Greenpeace could be my new partner in the New Year?
It’s true, for me, green living inflicts both thoughtfulness and guilt; as Americans, we are so deserving.
But when my editor put a torn page from The New York Times Magazine on my desk with the words “Look into this,” scribbled beneath some ad copy, I moved like the green flash. The copy read, Earthjustice: because the earth needs a good lawyer. Once again, like Redford in my inbox, an environmental organization had grabbed me at first glance. And while I had previously thought Greenpeace and Paul Watson were just a ship-full of crazed pirates, by talking to Anna Cederstav, a passionate scientist in a sea of earth loving lawyers at Earthjustice, I finally learned some truths that the environment has been dying to share.
