A Peek Inside My Mind at 4 AM

At 4 AM last night, I woke up with the following image in my mind: a polluted, overpopulated, third world slum.

What? This doesn't happen to you?

Let me explain. I suffer from anxiety attacks in the middle of the night. They usually keep me awake for a couple of hours, although this past year there have been a few instances when I wasn't able to fall back to sleep at all. The subject of the anxiety changes. It can be anything from hyperventilating over a cell phone bill that I have yet to pay, to worrying about when the Big One is going to hit Los Angeles. (Which reminds me: I need pay my cell phone bill and organize our earthquake kit...)

The closer we get to bringing a child into this world, however, the more I've been waking up with images of our troubled environment burning in my brain: polar bears stranded on diminishing chunks of ice in the Arctic, islands of garbage bobbing up and down in our oceans, loggers slicing down giant trees in the Amazon. (Cue Earth Song by Michael Jackson).


I'm really worried about our planet. This concern began in the sixth grade, when my teacher, Mrs. Station, made us watch videos about farmland drying up due to lack of fresh water, the perils of overpopulation, landfills filled to capacity with plastic bottles that won't decompose for thousands of years, and the effects of global warming. This was way back in the late 80's (no need for specific dates here!). Needless to say, these lessons had quite an effect on me, and they're all coming back to haunt me as I wonder what kind of planet my child is going to inherit?

Sure I worry about other things too, like terrorism, the economy and the inexplicable appeal of Justin Bieber. But humans have survived wars, depressions, and bad boy bands in the past. What's happening to our environment is unprecedented.

At 4 in the morning, these concerns are powerful enough to make me question whether or not I should even bring a child into this world. But recently, they've also begun to inspire me to take a closer look at myself. Sure I recycle obsessively, run around the house turning lights off when nobody is in the room, and bring my own bags to the grocery store.

But what else could I be doing to help this cause?


 

 Frightening images of our changing planet: polar bear clinging to iceberg and Justin Bieber's hair.