A Warm Summer Day In Jacksonville, Florida

This photo is for all of you who live in the southern hemisphere . We are still in our coats and sweaters here in North Florida. The weather reports for the U.S. sound like someone's bad dreams - snow, killer tornados, ice storms, baseball sized hail, huge trees uprooted, telephone and electricity out, dangers of mudslides and floods The earlier fears of a shortage of heating oil may come true if the weather doesn't start behaving in a more "normal" fashion.

While freezing temperatures sweep through large sections of the country, the inhabitants of the far north are seeing the icebergs melt and the ice sheets getting smaller and smaller. With evidence of global warming showing up in the polar regions, and the extreme weather patterns throughout the US, I don't understand how anyone can say that global warming doesn't exist.

I understand that weather changes are part of the natural cycles that our planet goes through. This same series of weather events may have taken place thousands, or millions of years ago. But my concern is for right now, and for the next generation. What about contamination of the groundwater and the water that I drink from my well? What is that stuff that floats by each day as the tide shifts in the creek? If the water levels are rising, how long before the foundation of my home is compromised by erosion? Will the beautiful blue herons that nest in the tall pine tree each year be poisoned by the the chemical runoff from lawns that are sprayed for weeds and insects? Will our next President actually do something about the environment?

The small steps that I take to be gentle with Mother Earth pale in comparison to the severity of the problems that face us. I recycle everything that I can. Our city, and county, takes glass, metal, paper, and some plastics for recycling. The grocery store accepts paper and plastic bags and certain foam trays and cartons. Many of the products I use come in containers that have recycled plastic in them, but I can't recycle the recycled containers! The businesses here aren't given recycle containers and cardboard boxes spill out of dumpsters when they could be reused or recycled.

I don't have any answers for the situation other than to encourage everyone to do whatever they can to help. Please reuse boxes and padded envelopes. Don't throw the "peanuts", bubble wrap and brown paper stuffing in the trash, either save it to use yourself or recycle it through your local agencies. When you get a package that is filled with peanuts that aren't biodegradable, write to the company that used them and encourage them to switch to the peanuts made with cornstarch. You can toss those in your garden and the first rain will dissolve them.

I could go on and on with suggestions and ideas. Instead, I will end this rant here with one more suggestion: Starting today, choose one more way to reduce the stress on the enviornment where you live and act on it for the rest of 2008. Please...