Earth Day
Earth Day was created in 1970 as a direct political challenge. Wisconsin’s Senator Gaylord Nelson wanted the US government to do what government is supposed to do — protect its people and lands from rapacious business. He created Earth Day and organized the first demonstrations across the country to force the hand of politicians. And it worked. A few months after that first day of mass protest, the EPA was created along with many of our foundational acts of environmental protection.
I believe every day is Earth Day, but some are more earthy than others. On this day, if I’m not participating in some form of protest (and recently, I haven’t done much of that), then I am engaged in more practical acts of environmental protection. I pick up trash, volunteer for restoration projects, and spend quite a bit of time in the garden. This year I’m doing all three. I have to clean up the filth that rude assholes have tossed into my Jungle. I am cutting down the invasive and aggressive plants in there also. And the whole of it will be in my garden.
I hope you are having as wonderfully restorative an Earth Day as I am!
canticle for earth day
gracious mother glorious creator generous progenitor we remember this day in gratitude in humility in wonderment we give heartfelt thanks for this being for these bodies for this magnanimous bounty no promise broken no necessity denied no love withheld even to these your wayward children is selfless solicitude bestowed and though in bottomless want we take more than our need yet on this day once more we come in supplication we pray that you open our eyes that you soften our hearts that you enlighten our minds and knowing there are those whose coldness is all consuming we pray that you protect our kin that you tend this peculiar living flame that you keep safe our peerless home from us holy earth miraculous world enveloping will we sing this day and we give thanks for no gift is greater than this life may it always be
Spring News
It is finally spring in Vermont. The daffodils and forsythia are blooming. There are weeds to pull. (There are always weeds to pull.) It has not snowed for a full two weeks, and it’s only dipped below freezing at night. It is rainy and blustery, but that is normal spring. The greens and radishes I sowed in the cold frame are finally growing, and I even have a few tomato plants, though sadly no chiles yet. Given the latest round of COVID, I have not planted peas, but I will be putting in fruit trees this week a little at a time. I suspect peas will happen.
But the thing that definitively marks the beginning of the warm season? I left the curtains open all night long over the weekend and did not wake to a freezing house. It must be spring!
Happy Earth Day!
©Elizabeth Anker 2024
By My Solitary Hearth 
A happy Earth Day to you too!
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