Dear Tomorrow,

I am writing this as a mother of three socially conscious adult children and at this moment grandmother to three young grandchildren, who will be most likely to experience significant effects of climate change in their lives. I believe that each individual as well as policy makers at the highest levels of society need to take action to reduce our carbon footprint on the environment. We all need to educate ourselves about climate change and learn individual actions we can take in our home, at work, and through the ballot box. Technology, science, and manufacturing has made my life easier, yet unless we protect our environment, the lives of those coming after us will be made more challenging. This is the time to make change.

When my daughter sent me the link to WeKnew.org, I didn’t rush to the website and then even after a few weeks didn’t jump at thechance to share my thoughts. Most of the time climate change is not on the front burner for me. Being retired and spending time cruising on our sailboat in the Bahamas, and hiking the trails in New Hampshire, I realize how important nature is to me. However, loving the outdoors and climate change are not readily linked together for me. One reason it took awhile to write my thoughts here is that I don’t feel that I am being proactive in the struggle to affect climate change. Yet, just thinking about this task over the past several days, has motivated me to shut off more lights, walk instead of jump in the car for a very short trip, and buy more locally.

The message here for my children and grandchildren is that you are all loved very deeply and I will commit to taking more steps to decrease my own carbon footprint and continue to educate myself in choices that I can make on a daily basis in hopes that collectively small changes can positively affect the future.