Category: Hopeful Wednesdays

October 21, 2020

by drplasticpicker

I was feeling pretty good last night as I was going to bed. I even started this Hopeful Wednesday post early. I wasn’t sure if I would need the Hope. But I got up this morning and checked CNN, and there are historic floods in the country of my ancestors. People have died. Crops have been submerged and ruined. There will be hunger. The village where my mother’s family has lived at least dating back to the 1400s if not longer, will be submerged with sea level rise. Our village is vulnerable to climate change. Further thousands of miles upstream, China threatens to damn a mighty river, and that will result in catastrophic environmental disaster as fish will die and the river will begin dying. This river is as mightly as the Mississippi. And multinational corporations are dredging already the river banks for the high quality sand that they use to make concrete.

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October 10, 2020

by drplasticpicker

I forgot why I did not write last week’s Hopeful Wednesday post? Let me think. [pause] Yes now I remember. I had been a bit overwhelmed on Tuesday with some HR issues and an avalanche of environmental work. The mood in the country was dark with the coronavirus as well. This week I had been getting semi-harassing text messages from a climate leader in a different part of the state. One of the climate groups is trying to get a letter with thousands of signatures. In principle I completely agree, but there has already been multiple letters written and the New England Journal of Medicine published a definitive editorial and endorsed a Biden administration. It seems like everyone is doing the same thing, and everyone wants to get their voice heard. I listened to the other physician climate advocate who is retired, but I felt semi-harassed. I honestly have a network of folks but I don’t want to exhaust them. Most of us work, and getting another thing to do which I’m not sure even makes a difference is not high-yield. Plus we had nothing to do with the content of the letter and they just want our signatures without any input. I’m not of the top-down environmental movement approach. Our committees are just our friend-group, so we have to do things together organically and make it fun. Plus the letter and the speaker was kind of preachy. Dr. Plastic Picker does not like preachy.

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September 23, 2020

by drplasticpicker

I really need a lot of hope this morning. Yes there are several national events that are upsetting. The Notorious RBG died of pancreatic cancer and her body is not even laid to rest, and already an orange-hued president whose name rhymes with DUMP has offered forth a replacement. A good portion of the Republican Party is upsetting me especially Mitt Romney, as they seem to be falling in line as this was their deal with the orange dumpy devil. Let him do whatever he wants as long as he tilts the highest court to the right. Then there are over 200,000 deaths due to COVID-19 in the US. Those 200,000 lost lives have created concentric circles of grief that are creating ripples in our communities. Yesterday I delivered one of my personal N95s to the airport to a friend of a dear friend whose wife is also a friend of my sister, as he boarded a flight in an attempt to see a friend who is being pulled off the respirator dying of COVID19. He is part of my community, and needed to say his goodbye. I don’t do these last minute heroics lightly and pulled a crazy U-turn near the closed San Diego Airport Cellphone Parking Lot. I had to confess to Mr. Plastic Picker last night my attempt to get to the airport on time. I made it and I hope my friend’s friend is able to say his goodbyes.

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September 16, 2020

by drplasticpicker

Above is a picture of my first born putting on his own shoes. For various reasons, I am very proud that he is able to do that and that he gets out the door by himself without assistance. Sometimes all of us just watch him leave from the porch: his grandmother, his grandfather, the puppy and myself. His sister was still sleeping because she had virtual school yesterday. He got to the car all by himself without any assistance, and his father (Mr. Plastic Picker) drove him to his fancy prep school in the family’s red Prius. They listen to NPR on the way to school. His breakfast was a vegan sausage and broccolli sauteed with some vegetable broth, and a piece of Dave’s Killer Wheat Bread which is palm-oil free. With that, he was sent forth into his teenage world hopefully avoiding COVID-19.

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September 2, 2020

by drplasticpicker

I am overdue to write this month’s Plastic Picking totals post https://drplasticpicker.com/plastic-picking-round-up/ and August’s Secondary Environmental Net Positives. I have a reasonable goal of 20 bags a month. This month I hit closer to 35 due to some big items left at several beach bonfires. I think I’ve salvaged over 100 items that were recycled or going to the GoodWill. There was a pair of gray vintage shoes that were still in a shoebox. I found reusable masks that are now regifted to other friends or upcycled as a office display on our daughter’s colorful and sparkly Build a Bear. I laundered them all twice. But I will write those post later this week because today is Wednesday (Hump Day) and I think everyone needs a bit of hope today!

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August 26, 2020

by drplasticpicker

This Wednesday kind of crept up on me. Since we went on a short trip to Palm Springs and returned on Monday, Tuesday seemed like Monday and Wednesday seemed like Tuesday. But the reality is that it is Wednesday. I realized that yesterday and knowing I needed to write this Hopeful Wednesday post lifted my spirits. My spirit is generally good these days, but the California Wildfires and the annoyance of the RNC nominating convention that I’m trying to actively ignore depresses my spirits a bit. But then one of our pediatric nurses sent this image to me of an upcycled trash art piece “Rainbow Fish” that she completed with her daughter. It is indeed beautiful and trash art gives me hope. Because through Trash Art, I have learned to look at the world a little bit differently.

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