I understand it but I don’t really “get it.” I guess we need an official “holiday” (April 22, 2020) in order to collectively pick up litter and celebrate the magnificence of the land we live atop.
I am not a romantic. I am a person who fathoms not the concept of making a celebration out of every little thing. Consequently, with some “holidays” I just can’t perceive the point of setting a day apart from all others to celebrate it. Some of us celebrate these things every day. I honestly just go through the motions with a few of these “minor holidays.”
Don’t get me wrong. What I call a “minor” holiday might be one of your favorites and ranks high on your celebratory radar. And that’s cool. Have at it. You certainly don’t need my “hoorah” to get excited about a day, or get a nod from the federal government or the post office to take a day to celebrate, away from the usual grind.
In fact, what’s minor to me might be major to most everybody else and vice-versa. Having studied the Bible I used to be downright annoyed that Hebrew and Christian scholars called Habakkuk a “minor” prophet. What? I’ll bet God didn’t consider him or Malachi minor.
So, did we not celebrate mother’s before May 9, 1914? And was love not the object of revelry before the 18th century embellishment of Saint Valentine’s “Day?” Now we have Siblings Day. I love my siblings every day and some don’t love theirs any day, but a holiday? Surely, we didn’t give one hoot about cleaning up the earth before “Earth Day” was conceived on April 22, 1970, did we?
I don’t know, but I think I’ve been picking up litter my whole life. I grew up in rural Pennsylvania, specifically Bedford County. I wonder if when our rural mother’s “picked up the house,” which meant tidying up the mess strewn about, came from “picking up” the litter strewn about their outdoor home. The “land” we lived on was significant, noticed, and respected.
I’ve walked firmly on the terra of this local land, intermittently, throughout my life. I see minor things like squished worms on the pavement; bright red, expended shotgun shells; oddly shaped or colored mushrooms; Snicker’s wrappers; beer & energy drink cans; empty chocolate pudding cups & chocolate milk bottles; gnarly, knotted vines; smokeless tobacco (snuff) cans; golf balls; differences in the look of mosses, up close; Styrofoam containers and packing material of all shapes, sizes and uses, from “peanuts” to takeout trays and coffee cups to huge cubes from someone’s latest Amazon acquisition, all in or near the woods.
These are objects that your usual auto or truck passerby doesn’t notice. One only sees these things with your feet on the ground. With the tons of roadside litter available to be picked up, apparently there are far fewer of us with our feet on the ground than in our vehicles, tossing the packaging of our lives out the window to the great beyond, or just to the brink of the woods. Also, the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation Litter Laws distinguish unintentional litter from the other, as the stuff that blows around in the wind, Kansas-style, Dorothy.
Oh, and I’ve seen even more “imaginative” things which I’ve picked up with the proverbial “ten-foot pole,” plastic gloves, and tank of antibacterial soap at the ready. Not really. I use a $1 generic dollar store “grabber-stick” to distance myself from the nastier objects that I pick up and discard in a trash bin or take home to include with our recycling.
“Out of sight out of mind” is real, my friends. And the opposite is true for me and my tribe of walkers, hikers, joggers, and ploggers (joggers who pick up litter, the Swedes “invented” this, just like Al Gore “invented” the Internet in some election cycle, some years ago).
“Where the rubber hits the road,” means when theory meets reality. Walkers see the reality of litter, every time we take a walk. Earth Day is not just a commemorative day to us, one that seems good in theory or in the abstract. It’s an everyday reality.
Socialism is not just a theory, studied in a book. To Venezuelans and others, it’s a devastating reality. The Holocaust is not a myth, talk to a survivor, read The Diary of Anne Frank, or Elie Wiesel’s books, especially, Night, which are NOT fiction. Climate change is, boots on the ground, real; what we should do about it is another matter altogether.
The pandemic of Corona-virus is no joke. Go to New York, oops, no you can’t, to see how it looks on the ground. For heaven’s sake wear a home-made cloth mask to the grocery store, it won’t kill you. I’ve done it, it’s not that bad, compared to the alternative. Wash your hands more often and more thoroughly. What harm can that do?
We’re all losing income right now and staying “home,” well…. Let’s face it, having “enough” money is relative to how you define “enough.” I think it’s fair to say that you and I don’t have enough of it. And, staying home should feel pretty good to those of us who have one.
In fact, a while ago when I was picking up litter along a secondary rural road while walking, a young man emerged in his vehicle from a local industrial business, stopped, rolled down his window and asked point blank, “Do you have a home?” After I picked up my jaw from the pavement, unfixed my duh-stare, and sufficiently suppressed the hysterics about to overflow from my gut, I said, “yes I do, thank you for asking.”
Granted, I wear some casual clothes when I walk/jog, not tracksuit- or gym-clothes-worthy, but I really didn’t think I was exactly bag-woman-chic either. What did they call it? Boho? Maybe I should coin a new term for it: Earth Day Fashion, EDF-gear?
Presumably if you’re reading this in April 2020, you live in or near rural Pennsylvania and you’re spending a LOT of time at home. How about joining my tribe, but in your own time and location, and celebrate the concept of earth day?
Go to your favorite dollar store, donning your recyclable cloth mask and pick up a “grabber,” and set out for a plogging adventure. And keep your polite, best, COVID19 distance from the other ploggers. Maybe this endeavor will become a personal tradition, as well as a national holiday.