Earth Day 3am Thoughts

I hit the sack too early and now I am up at 3am. I have been trying to lull myself to sleep for the last 20 minutes and yet sleep just seem to be eons away now. I gave up and decided to try writing my thoughts down instead. What thoughts? I actually had jumbled ones few minutes ago. Then I launched my chrome browser and saw this:

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Today is Earth Day and the Google banner suddenly reminded me of my earlier plans to write a lengthy, hearty post on ways that we could take care of the earth. That too seemed eons away now and I'm left with nothing to write anymore.

Maybe I should just write about how Earth conservation has become a 'silent' passion for me. Silent because  I don't think I deserve the label environmentalist, conservationist, or  Earth/nature warrior. I don't think I've done something monumental to deserve such. But I do love the Earth very much and I am probably drawn deeper to it than I'd imagined.

I grew up surrounded by nature having lived in an agricultural province for 20 years and having been raised and fed by agriculture, I just know I am somehow obliged to give back what nature has done for me. My family has been toiling land since I could remember and is still toiling it up until this day. And I don't think we are going to give that a rest anytime soon. Nature has afforded us so much, I could never take it for granted. So despite moving away and setting up a new life for my own family miles away from that place I grew up in, I try my best to still give back. I live in the premise that even small, trivial acts of love for nature can be great ones when compounded with other small efforts. And I'd really like for my kid to learn to appreciate what nature and the Earth has provided her as well.

I keep a bowl beside me each time I get busy in the kitchen.
A bowl for peels and veggie scraps
to hand over to my husband later for his compost.

So I started with my household. My husband who before marrying me has never concerned himself  with garbage segregation and composting has now eagerly taken up that duty. My four year old daughter knows her plastic trash should always go to the bin (she pockets her candy wrappers if a bin is nowhere in sight or she would hold on to her trash until we see a bin). Small steps leads to big ones. I make the effort to always check and make sure I have a reusable shopping bag with me because to me using paper bags are just the same as using plastic (I see millions of trees killed every time I see stack and stack of brown paper bag in the SM Supermarket counter but that's just me). I almost always never leave the house without them (and I'm actually starting to subconsciously collect reusable bags of all kind hahaha but I'm looking at the stuff I've accumulate and I'm actually loving them).

Small steps can also invoke change. Small steps can also contribute. Small steps can influence others too.

At work, I put out the lights in the pantry and the bathroom when nobody's using them. I now make the effort to ALWAYS put off my desktop before I head home (and make sure the monitor is also off). I segregate my waste when I'm at work (well most often than not) and try to recycle as much paper as I can (because my heart always bleeds when I see a huge stack of paper going to the trash).

I think being aware that me alone can wreck havoc in Earth makes a whole lot of difference. Because by being aware of the damage I can make, I tend to think twice, thrice, many times before I do something to nature. I hope do the same too. When you're enjoying your time at the beach, try to make sure you don't leave your garbage behind Whatever you brought in, you bring it back because the beach doesn't need any of that. When you're out nature tripping, don't leave any trash too. The mountains don't need your empty water bottles and your plastic utensils (next time just bring the real, reusable ones okay?). I could write more but it's just too painful for me to recall now how our indifference is hurting the Earth so much.

I know you might have read this a million times before, but when will this ever stick to you? YOU CAN'T JUST TAKE AND TAKE. YOU HAVE TO GIVE BACK TOO.

I know I am far from being the perfect Earth citizen. But in knowing that, I believe I am doing something already. By knowing that, I now take caution. Because I don't want to harm MORE than I've already did.