Heather Ward

What a crazy month. I was really looking forward to participating in 50th Earth Day celebrations, but obviously that didn't happen. I am appalled by how many plastic grocery and produce bags I have gone through since reusable bags were banned. But on the other hand, I am grocery shopping more deliberately. Without the chaos of "life," I've been able to plan out meals better. I also haven't needed to fill my gas tank in over a month, so that's good in several ways. And I've been getting outside for a walk every day, something I didn't do before.

Today is the 50th anniversary of the first Earth Day. While I wasn’t around at that time, I know it created a huge environmental movement that resulted in the EPA, the Clean Water Act, and the Clean Air Act, among others, under the presidency of Richard Nixon. In many ways, we have come a long from then, when rivers burned and storms dropped acid rain. But in many other ways, we have progressed little if at all. We have burned more fossil fuels in the past 30 years than in all human history before then. Our rate of plastic production is swiftly increasing. Deforestation is occurring faster than ever. Less than four percent of all mammals (by mass) on Earth are wild; the rest are humans and our domestic pets and livestock.

I remember, as a kid in the 80s and early 90s, learning about recycling, the ozone hole, and pollution. I knew about deforestation in the Amazon, species extinction, and global warming. This was before the internet, and all I can think of today is that I, personally, have known about this for thirty years. THIRTY YEARS. As a kid, I couldn’t do much, so I recycled what I could, and cleaned up litter along the street by my house. I think I planted a couple trees, and talked to my friends about what was going on.

Occasionally I wish I had gone into environmental science, but math is applicable everywhere, so I do not regret it. I missed a lot of time in high school and college because I was focused on my studies (again, I do not regret that), but the past 15 years or so I have been educating myself on what is happening to our environment, and what can be done to help. Having a day once a year to go around, saying “Happy Earth Day!” and showing off how much we recycle is not enough. How many of us truly live by the catchphrase “Make Earth Day Everyday?” Or even follow “reduce, reuse, recycle” IN THAT ORDER? Very few. Life gets in the way. I know, I’m a mom. I do what I can, but it’s not enough.

Also out of the 80s came the phrase “think globally, act locally.” One person cannot do much for the whole planet, but if all of us work to better the place where we live, the effect will be cumulative, the theory goes. Think of Greta Thunberg. She began by protesting her local government, and has since inspired millions of kids (and adults) to protest their own governments. However, changing my shopping habits or converting my lawn to a wildlife habitat is unlikely to spark a movement. This is why I chose to get involved in my community, as part of the Environmental Sustainability Board and as part of a citizen-led educational zero-waste team.

I cannot take on Koch Industries, or ExxonMobile, or Wells Fargo, but I try to think about ways I can reach out beyond my community, especially in this time of isolation. And the one thing I keep coming back to is my art. I am a wildlife artist, but do not focus on the typical species like tigers, elephants, and elk. My hope is that I can introduce new and incredible species to a wide audience. Each one of them has a role to play in this vast ecosystem, and each is vital to our survival as a resident of this planet.

This little town I live in has changed a lot in the 17 years I have called it home. We get considerably less snow in winter now. We have several days a year above 90 degrees, when before we had none. Winter lows rarely get below 20 anymore. The monsoon rains used to be so predictable you could set a clock by them. Now they are erratic. The grand ponderosa pines are dying of thirst and beetle infestations. The temperature-sensitive pikas are moving upslope to escape the heat.

The Earth is one giant web of interconnected ecosystems, each reacting to all the others. We are destroying those connections, isolating some systems, poisoning others, eliminating still others. Our disregard for the wild spaces and wild life and our belief in infinite economic growth on a finite planet will be our downfall. The novel coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2, which causes Covid-19, is only one way nature is battling back. This is just the beginning.

Back before the lockdown, I was lucky to be able to hear Dahr Jamail, author of The End of Ice, speak in person. One thing he said stays with me. “Hope is not the belief that everything will turn out well. Hope is the belief that something is worth doing regardless of the outcome.” This is the way I feel now. I am not optimistic about the future, but I refuse to go down without a fight.