This is a longer post, but bear with me, I'm trying to make it easy to read.
I'm clumsy. Living on my own for the first time, there's always a chance I'm gonna lose stuff--I'll break it, or it'll get contaminated with something, or some other weird.
But I really wanted some nice dishes. So when I saw a horrific 70's-style mug, I thought, you know what? This is awesome. I should buy it.
And it broke. Took out my silverware, my other dishes, and my can opener with it--the shards got everywhere.
So I could've given up. I could've gotten paper plates and plastic cups and never gotten anything nice again. Obviously it'll just get wrecked, right?
Or...I could have gone to the store and looked for plastic.
Why plastic? Because the problem was it breaking. But plastic will just bonk the floor and be fine.
And I found some absolutely gorgeous plastic, and I am now eating and drinking out of my Very Nice Dishes. And when they fail, I will find the problem that made that happen, and I'll try again.
When we think about nuclear war, that's terrifying. And it seems like there's no way to stop it. It seems like we'll all just die tomorrow and nothing will work.
But that's kind of like me being clumsy. Part of me says 'you'll just break it'. And I might...but in the meantime, I got something just a bit better.
We might die tomorrow. But what if we have more trees? More flowers? Better parks?
In the 50's, people were very sure that nuclear war was coming. They wouldn't live past five years from then. They built bunkers, but never expected them to work.
But they also planted trees, and made parks, and started figuring out how to clean up the planet. Because sure, they might not get a lot out of it...but it was sure nice to have rivers that weren't on fire, and more flowers, and parks, and maybe it was worth it.
It's 2025. We aren't dead. Our grandparents planted trees and we rest in their shade.
And if we plant some more trees? We get to watch them get bigger, and even if the bombs fall--and they haven't yet--then we still may get that week, that month, that year...
Even if we all die tomorrow, we can be happy that we tried tonight. We can enjoy getting outside, meeting other people, planting trees and cleaning rivers and being able to do something good with ourselves.
I really like my new dishes. Even if I lose them, they're worth having them for a while.
If we fight for the environment, it may pay off in the long run. If it doesn't, we still got to be happy.
It's worth it. I promise.