a personal perspective by college student, Andrea

I am a 19 year old girl, sophomore in college (though we actually don’t even use that term at my college), Mexican-American, consider myself a “global citizen” (whatever that even means though I do have my own idea), and I like to laugh. My mind is malleable, but firm- I am quite stubborn. I get easily excited by life and in fact I am often convinced that I am in love with life. Something I believe more people should be, by the way.

This love of life comes from nature to be honest. It amazes me in every way. And I’ve been fortunate enough in my life to be born in one of the most beautiful places in the world, a place I consider to be paradise. I was born in Cozumel, Mexico and I love it, but it has taught me to love nature as well. It is a constant reminder of the awe-inspiring richness of our world and universe. It is a constant reminder that I am nothing but a speck of sand in the reality of existence.

So I guess you can call me a tree-hugger, you can call me a hippie, you can call me whatever you want. To be honest, I don’t care- unless you’re my mom or dad (or brother). I’ve always put my world above myself because I know I can’t live without it. And though I find this obvious, I have found throughout my years that it’s actually not obvious to everyone. Somewhat silly, but true… unfortunately. Unfortunately not everybody cares about nature and not everybody is amazed by what we get to live in and surround ourselves by. I don’t understand it, and I never will, and to be honest I won’t even try. Like I said, I’m stubborn and I think everybody should think about the fact that we are living on Earth. This beautiful, big, round, blue, fantastic place we call Earth. We also call it home.

Home. A strange word, with a lot of meaning. I definitely see where the word home could bring up both good and bad thoughts, but I think for the most part people like to give it a good connotation. I love my home and everything that comes with it. And with that, I include Earth. That means I love you, and your sister, and your father, and your grandmother, and your dog, and your fish, and your house, and your car, and all the unnecessary tidbits of life. It’s hard, but I try and I think I do an OK job at it. But it’s true- I do love you, because I love my home and I love life.

So lately there’s been this crazy theory (or whatever you want to call it) called global warming, right? You might have heard of it? It means we’re going to warm up so much we will eventually melt and become nothingness. To find the true meaning of it, please go read a book or scientific article. Or you can try Wikipedia. The thing is global warming is apparently a threat to our home. *GASP* What?!?! That’s right- it’s a threat, a problem, a risk, a sticky situation, a menace, a complication, bad thing, predicament, it’s a pickle we’re in!!

There’s a beauty behind this though. One that I am not completely sure of for this situation, but life has taught me one very important thing that I think people actually tend to forget a lot. When there is a problem, there is usually a solution. Like I said, beautiful! (It makes me want to say “Voila!” over and over and over again it’s so great.)

So what are we going to do? I don’t know… I mean, I’m sure there are plenty of things we can do. This is quite a big pickle we’re in, so we probably won’t find that ONE perfect solution that will fix all our melting problems, but I am quite certain that we can find many different little solutions that will equal one big VOILA!

This is my proposal: T-H-I-N-K.
Think about your life and your home and the interdependence in that. Then think about your house and everything inside of it. How do you treat your house and all your possessions? How do you treat your home?
Think about the fact that this is my home too, and that I love it just as much as you do. Think about the fact that this was your great-great-great-grandfather’s home and that it has continued on to be your home and that it will continue on to be your child’s child home(hopefully, if we don’t melt away).
Think about everything you do or did today. What did you do? Did you buy anything new or anything at all? What did you do with it? Was it worth it? But was it really worth it, meaning it was worth all the resources, energy, time, thought, and work put into it? Did you hug your child or tell your significant other that you loved them?

Basically, just think a little bit. Don’t stress yourself out- stress is not conducive to anything(except getting last minute 15 page papers done that you’ve procrastinated on for days…. P.s. try not to do that and remind me to follow my own advice). And one more thing, while you’re thinking, try to be a little USELESS. After all, where are we now after centuries of being useful?? Melting!