Earth Day, Part II: The Earth Loves a Doughnut

Earth Day Part II

I started my Earth Day with a free doughnut.

Which is funny because when I made a pot of coffee this morning to take to the office, I thought, “Man, this would really go great with a doughnut.”

Because that’s how people think in their heads.  Right?  Okay, probably the transcript for my internal monologue would read more like:

Coffee……  Mmmmm, coffee……  (SUGAR. SUGAR. SUGAR…….)  DOUGHNUT!

It’s funny, I never understood the attraction of a treat like biscotti until I started drinking coffee.  Something about that over-sweet with the distinct not of coffee.  Makes both better.

I had planned on enjoying my morning coffee—plain old dark roast—at my desk from a thermos the first hour or two of my workday.  I would crave a doughnut, but I would not eat one.  I have a policy about buying my own doughnuts.  I don’t do it.  Not unless I am taking out-of-town guests downtown to VooDoo.  Then and only then I buy a doughnut, you better believe it.  In those rarified circumstances there is a Portland Crème, an apple fritter, or an ODB in my future.

Turns out, today was cause for celebration on several fronts.

  1. It’s Earth Day and I enjoy living on Earth.
  2. Plus, we had a couple commitments for next season in the past day, both great swimmers we’ve been working with for a long time.  Great teammates joining great teammates!
  3. AND, free doughnuts from a pop-up tent at the first entrance to the undergrad campus.

My wife summed it up when I texted her about my good fortune: “The earth does love a doughnut.”

So true.

I think that we humans sometimes celebrate in funny ways.  And I love it.  I can only assume the doughnuts were there because it’s the same place that groups sometimes serve coffee and doughnuts to people commuting by bike to campus or on foot between our law and undergrad campuses.  Sort of like: “You’re making less of a dent on the environment, here’s a doughnut and some coffee.”

Or maybe it’s a matter of association.  I acknowledge we should protect our natural world and I thereby receive a free doughnut.  The two will be linked in my subconscious from here on out.

No matter the reason, my apple fritter was the highlight of my morning in the office.  Right up until free pizza at our staff meeting.

I realize I am just as food-motivated as my cat.

When she is hungry, our cat will wind around our ankles and meow.  Or in the middle of the night she will risk having a pillow or magazine thrown at her for licking plastic bags while we try to sleep.  Anything to let us know she is hungry.

I, on the other hand, will drive past a tent serving doughnuts, park my car faraway, and walk a few hundred meters up a large hill in the opposite direction of my office.  All for that sweet treat that I know will make my coffee and my morning better.

So worth it.

Did you know Earth Day began in 1970?  My first Earth Day memory is of the celebration in downtown Portland I went to with my mom when I was a kid—so, round about the mid-80s.  I remember feeling like Earth Day was something brand new that year.  Turns out, not.  Funny how our own first exposure to something doesn’t always bely its history.

In spite of the way I’ve made out like the most pivotal part of my Earth Day was the free doughnut, I care about the bigger picture, too.  Hopefully I made this clear when I railed against throwing cigarette butts from cars recently.

April is apparently my month for environmental diatribes, so it’s like I have been preparing for Earth Day for weeks in advance.

To wrap up April’s Earth focus, I cobbled together a few examples of ways we can chip in, make a dent, or otherwise stave off the destruction of our ecosystems:

  1. Use green power.   If you live in Portland, you can choose to have 100% of your electricity usage offset by renewable energy sources.  Will every city offer this?  Probably not.  Can you look into it?  Definitely.
  2. Little dents here and there.  Go two degrees cooler on the thermostat in winter.  Use blinds to block the hottest summer sun to avoid using as much AC (if you even have AC).  And pay attention to hidden energy-sucks like missing or rodent-ravaged insulation.
  3. Build green habits.  We all know about bike commuting.  If it’s feasible, try it.  Otherwise see where you can cut out an extraneous trip to the grocery store that you might plug in around your next commute.  In that same vein, I started occasionally running to the nearest Safeway in the evening and packing home what I can fit in my backpack when we are low on something mid-week.
  4. Read this list for some basic I-knew-this-already reminders and a few ideas you may not have considered.

Like most habits, you may have to work to form it in the beginning, but once the ball is rolling, it’s easier to keep it going.  There are a lot of people on this planet and we all have work ahead of us.  Be the person in your household or on your block or in your apartment complex who takes a step in the right direction.  One step here and one there.  Someone will notice and someone will follow your lead.

In closing I’ll say that while Earth Day is not all about free doughnuts, it’s still a little about free doughnuts for me and I’m okay with that.