It was a work day, so I didn’t expect much from this Earth Day. How can it be memorable if I have to work? I didn’t have the day off to work in the garden, mulch, plant herbs for the herb container garden. It was anti-climactic for an environmentally-focused person like me. But I figured I did something good – the day before, Sunday, I took a couple of bags with me when I walked the dog and picked up any garbage I found. And find garbage I did! Much more than I would have expected from my neighborhood which has a community lake as a focal point. I’ll keep the results of that for another blog.
Anyway, my work day started normally. I work in a couple of different locations, and I had to be in the 2nd location on Earth Day. This location is a little over an hour away and there are no highways to get there; I have to travel on busy two-lane county roads, so it’s a nice drive. After I finished my work day, I started driving home and about half-way home, I encountered a detour. It was unexpected because there wasn’t a detour on the way in; I grumbled, because this way home was longer, the roads were more rural and more narrow. But, as I have traveled these roads for the last 30+ years, I knew the detour I had to take.
The first half of the detour was uneventful. I was reminiscing about old, fun times traveling these roads so I was a little lost in nostalgia. But then all of a sudden, something caught my eye. Let me preface this with I am a birder. I love watching birds and trying to identify them. This is a hobby that I learned from spending summers with my grandmother. Most often the large birds I see while driving are various types of hawks and vultures.
So as I watched this large bird fly through the sky, I thought it was a hawk or a vulture. But then I noticed the tail feathers from underneath were all white; it was flying low enough that I could easily identify the color on the tail feathers. Most hawks that live in this area either have dark tails or have bands of color on their tail feathers (if you can see them) and the vultures don’t have white on their tails. There were no bands of color on the tail, just completely white feathers. The only bird I know of that size, with a completely white tail, is a bald eagle. A bald eagle! I had added seeing a bald eagle to my bucket list about 5 years ago, and actually saw one not far from my house a couple of years back, but still, it was a bald eagle! Now that’s not out of the question in this area, but not common as far as I knew.
Now I’m not one so much for ‘signs’ because I think sometimes we ‘see’ things to reinforce what we want, but when I went home and checked my bird book and looked in my area of the country, the only bird I could narrow it down to was a bald eagle. That was completely unexpected because I expect to see bald eagles nesting and living around rivers, not creeks, which is the water source in this area.
And even though I have seen a bald eagle before, I can’t help but feel it was almost a spiritual experience on this day focused on the earth and because they are so majestic and stand for all that is good and sacred in our country.
Luckily, about 40 years ago, we rallied as a nation because our national bird was endangered; due to man-made circumstances, bald eagles were having much difficulty hatching their eggs and raising their chicks to adulthood due to chemicals they were ingesting. We rallied as a nation to protect the bald eagles and saved them from a bleak future.
It had started out as a ho-hum normal day, but it turned out to be spectacular due to this chance encounter. It strengthened my resolve to continue to do everything I can to help make a positive impact on the environment. I know that I am only one person, but my efforts, when combined with the collective, can really make a big impact. That means I am powerful, just like you are powerful with every choice you make. When I choose to recycle everything I can, buy products made of recycled materials, choose more natural or ‘green’ options, I am powerful and I am sending a message that this is important to me and I am looking for these options in the marketplace.
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“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed it is the only thing that ever has.”
-Margaret Mead |
Did you have any special encounters on Earth Day? Did you do anything special to celebrate, and bring awareness, about the environment? I’d love to hear how you celebrated Earth Day!