Editor:
The news media is awash with predictions of the demise of the planet Earth due to prolific energy use, pollution, climate change, waste management, etc. so I have set out to save our planet.
I like to have fresh fruit with my morning cereal, especially raspberries, but I realize they come from California and Mexico. That involves planting, cultivating, irrigating, picking, and packaging (in plastic boxes made from evil oil) – all activities using energy of some sort.
Worst of all the raspberries are shipped over the long distance in trucks using copious quantities of fuel oil (that evil product again). Then there is storage, reshipping and handling at my local supermarket – more energy use. So for the cause I have forgone raspberries for my morning cereal.
My hobby is working with wood, which I realize comes from trees that have to be cut down, and thus eliminate their marvellous process of removing carbon dioxide (another evil) from the atmosphere. The felling, sawing, planing, and hauling of logs and lumber involves use of much energy, so I have ended my hobby which gave me much satisfaction.
I much enjoy a music festival in England each summer, and visits with family in the opposite ends of Canada. But these journeys involve long distance travel by airplanes which consume prodigious amounts of fuel (that evil again). So such trips are now cancelled.
You may see where this is going. Now I live in an unheated shack, dress in rags, go nowhere, and do nothing but eat porridge three times each day.
Mine is a miserable existence. I pine after raspberries – but I have saved the planet.
Keith Thompson,
Canmore
