Every Day Is Earth Day

Environmental causes for me started when I was 14, when I read about the whooping cranes were mysteriously disappearing. I wrote my major freshman English term paper on this theme and was practically laughed out of class by the teacher and some smug classmates who had plumbed the depths of symbolism in Alice in Wonderland or some other English theme. I got a kick out of it because most of my English classmates were Jewish. It was 1962 and we were soon to learn that the pesticide DDT was accumulating in our systems and acutally killing our wildlife. We almost lost our great American symbol, the bald eagle to the poison. It has just now come back, 2008 officially. This watercolor is one of my favorites in the California Marine Life Sanctuaries series because it includes a bird sanctuary in the Carmel River State Park, Carmel, CA. It's not the popular and glamourous Pebble Beach, CA scenes but more reflective of the environmental thinking I like to highlight in my watercolors. There are no animals or humans or anything human made in any of the scenes but are usually about areas where animals are being protected in the Sanctuary and gently suggest human involvement could be behind the scenes in giving to the non-profits that protect the wildlife.

When we first actively started promoting the Monterey Bay Marine Life Sanctuary, I asked Rep. Leon Panetta's office for a list of groups that were involved in helping to support the Sanctuary. It wasn't official yet but I felt sure. His secretary said she really didn't know but would do some research. Later, I got a letter with mainly 2 groups and the main one was Save Our Shores. That was 1989-90.

Here is a list of groups I actively support online that are involved in environmental issues: Union of Concerned Scientists, Ocean Conservancy, The Wilderness Society, Defenders of Wildlife, League of Conservation Voters, Sierra Club, Earthjustice, Ploughshares Fund, Ocean Champions, The Humane Society, Green for All, PeaceWest, Ocean River, Environmental Working Group, NRDC, Care2, Save the Bay, ASPCA, Eco-justice Program, WE can solve the climate crisis, International Fund for Animal Welfare, 1 Sky, National Wildlife Federation, PEW Environmental Group, Ocean Wavemakers, Nuclear Age of Peace Foundation, ROAM. There are probably more. You can cut and paste; providing the links was too time-consuming.

Happy Earth Day!