blog action day

Today is blog action day. I've just spent a good half hour reading earnest posts about the topic, the environment. (I get so many feeds, I could spend all of my life reading feeds.) I feel that I should be a good blogger and post in this vein but it's not that easy.

I'm a very optimistic person when it comes to my own life. I wake up every morning with the realization that I'm extremely lucky to have been born in this place and time. I'm in good health and lead a very active lifestyle in a great city. I have more than enough money for one person. I've travelled extensively and regularly attend the symphony, the opera and the theatre. I have an amazing circle of friends. And although complaining is one of my favourite pastimes, I'm willing to admit that my problems are ridiculous stacked up against those of others. Here are some things that made me crazy today:

- I couldn't give a doctor my family history because most of my family died in various wars. It would be nice to have more family (BUT if I did, I probably wouldn't like most of them anyway).

- I went to get an allergy I've had since May diagnosed. Itchy, watery eyes, sneezing and post-nasal drip be damned! The allergist found nothing (BUT I'll go to some naturopathic quack and he or she will make me injest something frightening and all will be well).

- My job is not exactly brain surgery and at times I feel I am slipping into a coma during business hours (BUT then I didn't sign up for brain surgery and someday I'll just quit and get it over with).

Hardly life or death matters, right? So it should be easy for me to post some drivel about how everyone should recycle, eat less meat, wear only organic bamboo and hold hands and sing a crappy Coke song about teaching the world to sing in perfect harmony. (I think I just dated myself.)

But, much as I'd like to be, I'm not so optimistic about the world. I made a conscious decision a long while ago to not have biological children. This is not only because I've seen too many kids in the world who have nobody, but also because I'm not sure the next generation is actually going to have an earth. I'm not trying to be super dramatic here, but there are so many factors that are contributing to Armageddon. Massive deforestation and shark-finning, among other horrible things, are happening because people in poor countries are just trying to keep their family alive. Corporations are causing massive environmental damage all over the world with nobody to police them. And we all know about global warming now and the role each of us has played in that. There's so much more but I won't go on; it's all just too depressing.

To me the future looks a lot like the frightening scenes of Children of Men (the movie, not the book, which is an excellent read, but is about something totally different).

So maybe now that it's blog action day, I won't try to post something hopeful and happy. I'll just post this and hope that someone will turn what I've just written on its side. I can dream, can't I?

RainyBow