an introduction of sorts

Who I am: I am a 28-year old (female) writer and environmentalist. I have great friends and family. I am madly in love with my boyfreind of two years. Together we have two golden retrievers, three cats and a rabbit -- i love animals! I enjoy reading, keeping up to date on environmental and political issues, playing in the dirt, and i'm learning to be a better (and more local) cook. I pride myself on trying to reduce the carbon footprint of myself and of my household.

What I believe: I believe the key to success of the environmental movement will be a combination of grassroots activity and legislative action both in the capital and in worldwide accords. I believe that every person should try to reduce their carbon footprint because it is the right thing to do, not necessarily because it is going to solve our global warming problem. I believe that government subsidies on gas should be removed to discourage the driving of monstrosity vehicles, and those on crops should be reduced to encourage the local economies of food growing. I believe our political system is deeply flawed, but not beyond repair. And finally, I beleive that the consequences of the world warming and of our wasteful, selfish way of life, will have to show themselves much more vividly than they do now in order to motivate a true revolution.

How I got here: A few years ago, I went searching online for a community of people with Cystic Fibrosis, a genetic disease mainly affecting the lung and digestive systems of 30,000 Americans. After some looking, I found this at www.cysticfibrosis.com. After a year or so, they began offering blogs for their members, which I took up and have been writing in since. Although a lot of what I wrote about was at least in part centered on how cystic fibrosis affects my life, I also wrote about a number of other personal issues including environmentalism. Although some people were positively affected by what I wrote, I can't help feeling like my message was largely lost among a population of people only semi-interested. Granted, I think this is an important front to work, so I will continue posting there. But I thought it would be more productive, both to spread my words and to get myself writing more consistently about green topics, to create a blog elsewhere.