Healthy Indoors | 47
While I read the headlines, I look out
my kitchen window. It's just so…balmy.
"Abnormally warm weather to dominate
Lower 48" at least for the next two
weeks, exclaims my local paper, The Wash-
ington Post. Abnormal doesn't begin to
describe it. Temperatures hit 70 degrees
on one day, then dropped 14 degrees in
an hour as winds gusting to 49 mph blew
through. Average highs around this time
of year usually range closer to 51 degrees.
Meanwhile, Baltimore almost made it to
70, while Philadelphia hit 67 and New
York 61. We all should be getting out our
shovels and snow boots. Instead, we're still
raking fall leaves and planting spring bulbs.
I think back to the year I lived in
Denver. It was the 1970s, I'd just gotten
out of college, and decided to head west
to ski while I figured out my life. Turns out,
then was a good time to go. It started
snowing in October (if not sooner), and
I remember skiing on my birthday after
a big snowfall—in late May. Granted that
was four decades ago. But forty years isn't
even the blink of an eye in the meteoro-
logical scheme of things. If I tried the same
thing today, I'd be out of luck; it's been
nearly 230 days without any measurable
snow accumulation in the Mile High City.
Research shows mountain states in the
West might be completely snowless in 35
years, yet another abbreviated eye blink.
After Hurricane Ida blew through
here this past September after wrecking
Louisiana and other parts of the south,
my neighbor texted me that the big 100+
year-old mulberry tree that used to shade
my backyard had been blown over into
hers. At least it didn't fall on my house,
which would have cost me thousands.
Three months later, trees are still on
my mind – Christmas trees, that is. From
Oregon to Vermont and Virginia, climate
change is taking its toll on the firs, spruces
and pines farmers grow and consumers
buy during the December holiday season.
"It's gotten to the point where we can't
grow certain species," Virginia tree farmer
Frans Kok told Fast Company. The Caldor
wildfire, itself a product of climate change,
burned more than 200,000 acres in
California this year and destroyed around
40 percent of the larger Christmas trees
on one family-run tree farm in the vicinity.
What can we do?
Elect officials to local, state, and nation-
al office who understand that climate
change poses an existential risk to our
health and well-being. We need policies
that will make it easier to phase out
the use of fossil fuels and phase in solar
collectors, wind turbines, and other clean
energy technologies. But we won't get
those policies if we don't elect people
wise enough to advocate for them.
Pressure officials we already have
elected to pass clean energy laws and
regulations and support President Biden's
Build Back Better plan. A new Congress
won't be elected until November. Let's
not wait 11 months to take as many
smart energy actions as we can.
At home, shrink your own carbon
footprint. Insulate your attic and crawl
spaces, replace old energy-wasting
appliances with "smart" efficient ones
that meet EPA's Energy Star standards
for performance and efficiency, buy less,
and waste less — especially food. Here
are seven ways I've shrunk my carbon
footprint that might help you, too.
And, be prepared. David Pogue lays
out dozens of smart action steps in How
to Prepare for Climate Change: A
Practical Guide for Surviving the Chaos.
Sure, weather changes from day to day
and season to season. But the changes we're
seeing these days aren't the normal ones.
They're weird and dangerous.
Diane MacEachern is an award-winning en-
trepreneur and long-time green expert who
was named one of America's EcoHeroes
by Glamour magazine. The recipient of the
Image of the Future prize from the World
Communications Forum, Diane founded Big
Green Purse to enable women to use their
consumer clout to protect themselves, their
families, and the planet. A best-selling author,
Diane's "how to go green" books have
collectively sold almost four hundred thou-
sand copies. Diane provides expert advice,
consumer guidance, and employee engage-
ment workshops to such companies as Avon,
St. Ives, Whole Foods, Frito Lay, American
Bankers Association, Pacific Life Insurance,
the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency,
and the United Nations Development
Programme. She also speaks to non-profit
groups, religious institutions, colleges and uni-
versities, and a wide range of civic organiza-
tions. Diane lives with her family just outside
Washington, D.C., in the environmentally
friendly, energy-efficient home they helped
design and build.
TELL THE SENATE:
SUPPORT THE BUILD BACK BETTER ACT
