We're in the trough of winter here in Minnesota, when even the most green-minded of us looks for a little self-indulgence in the sub-zero temperatures. The windchill factor is real and worrisome here, and it's become a bit of a bore hearing global-warming naysayers gloat about the planet's icebox days being the most severe in several years - at the same time local Arctic explorer Will Steger is teaching schoolkids about the melting Arctic ice and the sorry state of the iconic Polar Bear. It doesn't seem to do any good to explain to them that the farther you pull a pendulum before you let it go, the farther it will swing in the opposite direction before everything just stops.
Locally, too, we've had bad news on the environmental front. Winter is a time when auto emissions are visible and air quality problematic, and the cost of fuels for transportation and heating combine with that effect to make us super-alert to the many costs of internal combustion - so it's disappointing to learn that one of Minnesota's longed-for fixes, ethanol, has turned out to be a false hope for quenching our thirst for cleaner fuel. In fact, it may leaves us just plain thirsty: A large ethanol plant in the western Minnesota city of Grand Rapids ran out of groundwater and pumped water out of the Minnesota River, one of the major tributaries of the Mississippi River here, at the headwaters of the Mississippi system.
While we wait for longer, milder days and better news we continue to work for a more sustainable lifestyle that honors the planet on which we are fortunate to ride, and that honors the demand of justice for our posterity. And we celebrate our love of life, planet, and grandBaby every chance we get.
For instance, Terry Gips, founder of the Alliance for Sustainability in Minneapolis, is celebrating his 57th birthday; the rest of us celebrate Terry's significant influence on the green consciousness of thousands of individuals and hundreds of organizations. Those of us looking for a material gift for our loved ones can find something conscious of sustainability's five Rs at ReGift, whose founders Tina and Ryan make us think again about what we baby boom elders can do to support the efforts of our children and grandchildren - while still enjoying the best of our hunter-gatherer instincts. I have decided that my own sweet-toothed grandBaby and his excellent mother will have the benefit of the heart-shaped chocolate cakes I baked in her childhood - but this time, created with organic fair trade chocolate and the same organic, locally produced butter from Organic Valley Farms that we enjoyed in our Christmas baking.
We'll defy the cold weather by keeping warm together under a wooly blanket on the couch - an energy efficient approach to grandparental affection. Happy Valentine's Day to us, every one. Live Green, and Prosper.