I often wonder.
When I was pregnant with my third child and my other two sons were 6 and 8, we used to walk a lot. One time there was a big fridge carton box on the road between two pedestrian crossings, cars could hardly get around but nobody bothered to pick it up. So when I stopped the car flow and took the box there were eager people to help. Not before. Same happened when some glass bottles were broken in the middle of the walk path. We went into the store just a few meters away and asked for a broom and a pan. Some more faces reddened. When we go to a cafe they still pick up their cups and return everything where they belong. We even take the recyclables home if there is no recycling there.
Of course that was in a different country at different times. Now we are here in Ottawa; in a big city with big mess.
I couldn't care less about people eating and smoking while driving, it's their car and their mess. But when gallantly they roll the window down and throw their butt or McD. bag to our windshield, that bothers me. These people not only act juvenile but they are irresponsible enough to be parents too. Ouch!
As far as I know the city has a good garbage removal system, there are many public garbage cans, butt out stations and recycling places but I wonder if most of the population knows what they are for.
I wonder how it is that they were born here in Canada, raised and educated here and still live in the stone ages where it was custom eating with fingers (MacDonald's) not knowing what a table and plates are for, spit wherever they please, pee on the side of the road towards the cars and this is the point you can bet I don't want to see more of anything else they do!
Do you ever wonder why we have our environment full of bacteria and viruses and we are getting addicted to antibacterial hand lotions?
Can you spot the connections?
TRUCKERS, PLEASE! You are on the roads all the time. That is your workplace. Everybody likes to take care of their own work environment. So please set a good example and find the trashcan. When smoking, leave your butts in the designated sand box. We don't actually have to see a butt bed instead of a flower bed. Support recycle stations. Did you know that only a few percent of plastic bottles are recycled and the rest goes to the land field? Every week Americans throw away so many bottles they could go around the planet 5 times if we put them end to end!
Responsible ways to handle our excess materials may just help ourselves in the long run. Has responsibility become a scary word by now? Have we become so ignorant and careless that we just trash our world?
Just to remind us everything and everybody on Earth comes from nature and after being used ( eaten, pooped, shed, created, used, stored, thrown away etc.) goes back to the air, the earth, water and will become US again, YOU AND ME. The earth is a huge recycling system where every atom has been going around and around for over 4 billion years. They had been part of the first fish, the dinosaurs, trees and have been within the volcanoes as molten rocks.
Do you know what is missing from teaching the water cycle? Yes, we were taught it goes from the oceans to the clouds and it rains again down to the rivers and underground wells, resurface again or with an earthquake it goes under for a few million years where it again gets mixed with lava and creates fertile soil where we eventually grow our crops and by that we get the precious water again within us. WOW!
Isn't it majestic and makes you humble?
It does with me. I awe and serve this earth that is our greatest emperor and nurturer of all times.
Amen. So be it.
