Last Sunday a small crew from Nina Designs signed up to help clean an East Bay Park near the Berkeley Marina. I’ll be the first to admit that I have never done anything like this before. I’ve always wanted to, always meant to, but never got around to doing it. I was happy when Anna, head of our new Fun Committee here at Nina Designs, decided to plan this event for Earth Day. Thanks Anna!
Having never done this before, I didn’t really know what to expect in terms of what kind of trash we’d find out their on the bayshore. What I imagined (lots of soda cans, plastic bottles, larger chunks of trash) is not what we found. When we arrived to the shore, we were told to focus primarily on plastic, since it never goes away, but only turns into smaller and smaller pieces that get into the food chain. And, focus we did. We picked up three garbage bags full of tiny pieces of plastic in just a 20 ft. area. Much of the plastic was broken, unidentifiable pieces of this and that. Lots of styrofoam and plastic baggies. But we picked up so many plastic straws and plastic soda pop lids that I have taken a personal pledge to never, ever use plastic straws or drink soda again.
Wish me luck as I know my resolve will dwindle as the year marches on. But now that I’ve done an Earth Day clean up once, I plan to do it every year. An annual reminder of just how much plastic I don’t need in my life sounds good to me. Happy Earth Day to our beautiful planet. I pledge to do as much as I can to keep it that way.
Happy Earth Day to our Beautiful Planet!
Bags of Trash!
