Holiday Challenge

This lovely Santa’s Workshop display has been on the fireplace mantle since the mid-1940s. No doubt Santa has been down with CF since way back.

There are so many problems in our world; so many disputes and injustice, and we are looking at some pretty hard times next year. But we won’t make it as a species blaming each other for all the wrongs.

I’m challenging myself to choose peace and forgiveness, for my own sake, and for all life on Earth. Will you try it too?

A friend of mine sent me this little story. As I read it, I was reminded how perception is an interpretation of experience.

It’s not easy to get along, but we can if we choose to.

THAT GREEN THING

While checking out, a young cashier suggested to me that I should bring my own grocery bags next time because plastic bags were harmful to the environment. “Sorry,” I retorted, “We didn’t have this green thing back in my day.” “That’s the problem,” responded the clerk. “Your generation didn’t care enough to save our environment for us.” She was right — our generation didn’t have the green thing.

Back then, we returned milk bottles, soda bottles and beer bottles to the store and they sent them back to the plant to be washed and sterilized and refilled. But we didn’t have the green thing.

We walked up stairs, because there wasn’t an escalator in every store and office building. We walked to the grocery store and didn’t climb into a 300-horsepower machine every time we had to go two blocks. But she was right. We didn’t have the green thing in our day.

Back then we washed the baby’s diapers because we didn’t have the throwaway kind. We dried clothes on a line using wind and solar power, and our kids got hand-me-downs. But that young lady is right; we didn’t have the green thing back in our day.

Back then we had one TV or radio in the house — not one in every room, and it had a screen the size of a handkerchief, not the size of the state of Montana. In the kitchen, we blended and stirred by hand. When we mailed a fragile item, we used wadded up newspapers to cushion it, not Styrofoam or bubble wrap. We didn’t burn gasoline to cut the lawn; we used a push mower that ran on human power. We exercised by working and didn’t need to run on electrical treadmills. But she’s right; we didn’t have the green thing back then.

We drank from a fountain when we were thirsty. We refilled pens with ink and we replaced razor blades instead of throwing the “disposable” away. Back then, people took the streetcar or a bus and kids rode their bikes to school or walked instead of turning their moms into a taxi. We had one electrical outlet per room, and we didn’t need a computerized gadget receiving a signal beamed from a satellite to find the nearest pizza place. But isn’t it sad that the current generation laments how wasteful we were?

Please forward this to other selfish old farts who need a lesson in conservation, but beware — don’t make us mad. We don’t like being old in the first place, so it doesn’t take much to piss us off! by Planet Proctor
–from Suzy & Gerry www.Laughtears.com

Cold Fusion Now!

Related Links

Suzy Williams What the Frack Is Going On? by Ruby Carat February 18, 2011

Suzy Sings a Superwave by Ruby Carat January 14, 2011

Gerry’s Day at the Beach photo