To the people of tomorrow, my family of tomorrow, the me of tomorrow,
In my English class, we read a book called Feed by Matthew Tobin Anderson and until this very day it is one of the most impactful books in my life because it has allowed me to have insight on a subject that no one likes to talk about. The reason the book left such an impact on me was because these people lived in a world where they were so consumed in their technology that they didn’t even pay attention to the news. They were so into the trends that they didn’t realize the world around them was deteriorating, pollution, war, illness, even themselves were dying and they thought it was so cool and part of a trend because the television told them it was cool, little did they know it was a disease. Anyways, the point is, now I’m in a class about Climate Change that zeros in on some of these real-world problems that a lot of us tend to not worry about because we think there’s nothing to worry about. When you take the time to look at the figures and the pictures in front of your face, I promise you will become alarmed.
As of today, that I am writing you (April 16th, 2018), our planet has experienced a pattern of increasingly high average temperatures in the past 30 years. What happens is we use electricity, burn coal, drive vehicles, or solar radiation that is released into the earth warming its surface. While some of the sun’s heat is trapped in the earth’s surface, some thermal radiation is sent into space, while the rest is absorbed into our atmosphere causing the greenhouse effect and warming our atmosphere. So, what does this have to do with the people of tomorrow, my family of tomorrow, the me of tomorrow, bear with me. Because of the dramatic shift in climate change over the past centuries, the heat is causing glaciers to melt, sea levels to rise, animals to die/become extinct. What we belong to is something called the circle of life, the fact that species can become extinct due to the inability to acclimatize or adapt in general should scare you enough. There are ways we can contribute and do our part to ensure that there is a tomorrow for you to be reading this letter.
Conserving energy sounds like the on your list of priorities but think of it this way, if you conserve you may save, so it serves as a purpose for you. The first easy fix is to change your lightbulbs to a compact fluorescent light bulb, they consume less energy and last longer than normal light bulbs. You can also contribute by carpooling! That is a huge one. I also did a paper on how CO2 emissions effects breathing last summer and let me tell you, if you think living by a freeway is convenient, your right, but the amount of CO2 you are getting in inhaling your body is ridiculous. Use less hot water, you’d be surprised but even the steam from a shower, or cooking on your stove contributes to your future. There are so many ways you can contribute, so even if you choose one change know your making some dent.
As only one person I know it sounds wild like you can’t change the whole world, but maybe you’ll read this and share it with your friends, and they’ll share it with theirs and that right there will make the hugest difference. The only way change won’t happen is if you don’t try. It doesn’t seem bad, but if we took a second to pay attention to the world around us, we would see that our world isn’t doing so great.
