EARTH DAY 25: ARE WE READY? Dear readers, t *. n. We here at the Edge, just by the virtue of being on the’ after month, sometimes get w hat "normal" folks w ™ 1? X a S s These Every once in a while we like to share with you, our lu c k y .^ ade^ vJ ,hese two postcards, looking for all the world like a ransom note, am v ed recently. Your guess is as good as ours. We just can it a n and let it go at that, -ed YES! By Kim Bossé The first Earth Day in May, 1970, has long been extolled as the advent of the environmental movement. Now, as we approach Earth Day's 25th anniversary, it appears that we are facing an indifferent and cavalier attitude towards conservation. Ecology & Recycling are not currently the trendy and hip espresso house discourse. In the last few months articles by environmental luminaries such as Theodore Roszak, Martin W. Lewis and Jeremy Rifkin have voiced opinions regarding the changing mind-set within the populace. Interwoven within their individual theories have been suppositions that the environmental movement itself is becoming endangered due to its own lack of clarity, continuity, and cooperativeness between groups to create solutions that will benefit everyone. The urgent nature of many conservation problems helps to create a perceived personna of non-scientific emotional blackmail. This, coupled with a changing political climate, economic uncertainty, and the general lack of education regarding conservation issues gives an aura of frivality to lifestyle changes such as source reduction, over-consumption, and natural resources/ energy demands. Whether we agree politically or philosophically, I believe that the individuals who live here care about our community and its inhabitants. Therefore, issues regarding the land we occupy, resources we use, and the non-human habitants are our common concern. I will go a step further and say it is for our common good to be educated, involved, and active in the choices made about the place we choose to call home. These are not issues that come in and out of vogue, rather, they should be lifelong commitments. So, my friends, I have some thoughts for you to consider as we approach Earth Day's auspicious milestone. Have you created opportunities within your lifestyle that allow you to be inclusive, tolerant, and respectful of the environment in which you live? Do you have the courage to stand up for your convictions, even if they aren't the flavor of the month"? If not, then possibly you, like many others, either haven't had the time to consider these issues or do not feel a pressing need to be committed to the preservation of our community. It would be nice if in this new year we all pledged to learn, experiment and grow in ways that help protect, improve and sustain our world. Perhaps we just need to pause in our sometimes overanxious quest for life to consider the old maxim that the simplest pleasures in life are often the best. They can also be gentle solutions to some of our environmental and societal concerns. Send me more information There is a great tendency to fix past mistakes. However, unless more effort is devoted to kxiking forward toward prevention rather than backward toward correction, we will continually be trying to catch up. “America has proved that it is practi­ cable to elevate the mass of mankind. ..to raise them to self-respect, to make them competent to act a pan in the great right and great duty of self-government; and she has proved that this can be done by educa­ tion and the diffusion of knowledge....” CAMMOM BEACH BOOK COM PANY “1 have defined the 100 percent American as 99 percent an idiot. And they just adore me.” ^ ^ Bgmard shaw P O Box 634 132 North Hentlock Cannon Beoch, 436-130) — Daniel Webster C oyote D is t r lb a t le n When you want the word out Mos W rig h t 2 3 0 -9 4 *4 » .© . » • « F T t l a n d OK B Y T IM O T H Y G O W E R Take this summer"s baseball strike. Millionaire athletes, most of whom would be parkrng cars were it not for their prowess on the diamond, com plained about being underpaid. Baz 1 honaire team owners, most of whom buy baseball clubs as diversions from their full-time jobs as megalomaniaca corpo­ rate tyrants, complained about losing money. Baseball fans missed out onthe end of the regular season but were treat­ ed to the World Series of Bitching. “I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart, , 1 am the Negro, bearing slavery s scar, I am the Red man driven from the land, I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek— And finding only the same old stupid plan Of dog eat dog, or might crush the weak. O, yes, I say it plain, America was never America to me And yet I swear this oath— America will be!” _ Langston Hughes i 1 --H f 2 D 1. F O L D O N D O T T E D L IN E A S S E E N IN E X A M P L E 2 3. S T A P L E O R T A P E T O H O L D Back in the U.S.S.A. EDGES TO G E TH E R . T H E N S TA N D ON END. ATURAL FOODS COOPERATIVE Member-Owned since 1977 A full-line grocery store specializing in organically-grown produce, grains, herbs, wines and coffees. Sea Garlic 415 NW Coast S L-N ew port, OR 97365 503-265-8285 and other organic vegetables Located in historic Nyt Beach David Siegel Neahkahnie Oregon 503-368 4 2 7 0 * Certified Organic Tilth by Oregon Til Field Museum This woman was 18 years old and had had at least one child when she died approximately 15,000 years ago In Cap Blanc, France. ÀCCLM t u a t ^ TÜL fZz? m a H c e . iM y ^ ur . L f The Upper Left Edge is a monthly ife .! The Moby Dick Hotel and Oyster Farm on Willapa Bay Nahcotta, Washington Now serves Dinner By Reservation Chef Julianne Maki Make Valentine's Day More Memorable or for that matter any getaway, business retreat, family reunion, et aJ For reservations or inform ation (206) 665-4543 fax 665-6887 P.O. 82, N ahcotta, WA 98637 1 broadsheet (approximately 12"X21") publication with a current distribution of 5,000. It is circulated throughout the Oregon and Washington coastal communities and larger metropolitan areas which serve them. As stated in the upper left corner of the Edge flag, it is FREE to the vast majority of its readership; though there is a rapidly increasing number of subscribers worldwide. Now in its third year of continual growth, The Upper Left Edge relies on advertising funds to keep it in print. « 1 URSULA ULRICH 1 Advertising rates are as follows Busi ness Card Si2e Ad I/1 6 th approx 3x5 178th approx 4x7 174th approx. 6172x9 $25 $35 $50. $100 $150 172 page $300 Full page $350 Back IK page . . . per month Payment ia due the 15th of the month prior to the iasue in which ad i3 to appear. Camera ready art is requested We are usually on the streets by the first weekend of the month !i li RELIEF TILES AID STEPPIRC STORES P 0 Box 667 Cannon Boach, OR 97110 5O 3-436-O 737 Original handmade cement casts in d ifferen t colours for interior and exterior decoration of home, business and public sites Wholesale. retail commiss'on |obs one o ra kind, co-work with architects and builders lIFfER LEFT CDGE TOMMY I9Î5