A few months back my wife purchased the entire Dr. Seuss collection to add to our growing book case of children’s books. We have made it a point to read to our daughter every day. It forms the foundation of our night time routine when putting her to sleep. We have read everything from the Hungry Caterpillar to Hairy McClary. I really enjoy these moments with Chelsea; it’s a bonding moment for us. I love to read and I hope that my children will one day develop a love for it as well.
For the past week all she has wanted me to read to her was, “I wish that I had duck feed”. I think I can recite the entire book from memory now. Last night as I was flicking through the Dr. Seuss collection, I came across, “The Lorax”. Chelsea had requested “I wish that I had duck feet’ again, but I was keen to change things up. With some argument, we managed to settle down in her bed and started to read.
The books start off with dark, neutral colours, not at all appealing to the eye, at this point I thought Chelsea is going to lose focus, but a few more pages in the pages brighten and immediately the book has got her attention again. Slowly as the book nears its completion the colours go from happy, bright colours that soon start to disappear and by the end we are back to the sad, dark, neutral colours again. Chelsea being almost three years old would not comprehend the message of the Lorax, but for me an adult, the effect of reading this book for the first time had quite a big impact.
The Lorax an advocate for the environment
The books tells a tale of a wealthy businessman, who started with nothing, but had a dream to create something that all people would want. He had dreams of wealth and building an empire. He finds himself in the land of the Lorax, where a particular tree the “Truffula tree” grew. Its leaves were softer than silk and gave off the smell of butterfly milk. A beautiful wonderous tree that provided food and shelter for the many inhabitants of the forest. The business executive known in the book as the Once-ler chopped down his first tree and created a garment of clothing that was highly versatile in its ability to be worn.
The chopping down of the first Truffula tree drew the attention of the Lorax, who was a voice for the trees and animals in the forest. The Lorax pleaded with the Once-ler to please stop doing this, he warned of the ramifications of it, but the Once-ler took no notice and saw that his product was desirable and that more products needed to be created. As his empire grew, the more Truffula trees were cut down, the Lorax would appear and plead with the business executive to stop what he was doing. There are scenes in the book where animals have now lost their shelter, lost their source of food, the waste product produced from the factories polluting water ways and ponds. Until eventually every Truffula tree has been cut down, every animal has left or died and there was no more money to be made. With sadness the Lorax also leaves, never to return.
The business executive looks out on the damage he has created, and is sad and regretful that his greed had caused him to destroy the land.
A window into current affairs
As an environmentally conscious adult, I am aware of the damage the human race has done to our planet and continues to do to our planet. Haley and I do our best to reduce our carbon foot print, but this children’s book however, hit me in the gut like a sledge hammer.
There is obviously debate on whether climate change has been caused by humans or not and this article does not serve to back any side of the debate, but what I want to bring to your attention is the visual and physical damage done to our environment. There are literal floating islands of garbage holding stationary in our oceans covering a surface area of 1.6 million square kilometres.
Plastic has been found on the surface of the ocean floor at a whopping 10,928 meters deep. 27% of The Amazon jungle the largest on the planet, considered to be the lungs of the earth will have no tree coverage by 2030, due to cattle farming, logging and other activities. Animal extinction has been estimated to be around 1000 times higher because of humans.
And the human cost per year is roughly 7 million premature deaths due to outdoor and indoor air pollution.
What can we do?
We need to take care of the planet we were put in charge of. As Christian we should be at the forefront of taking care of our environment. We need to be good stewards of what has been given to us and not reckless. Let us make positive steps toward decreasing our carbon foot print and let’s be more mindful of the products we buy and throw away. You might think you are only one person, what difference can you make? But this is how movements start and change comes about. After all, we are each responsible for our own actions. Let us not be like the Once-ler who only felt pain and regret, once everything was gone, dead and destroyed.
Jarred is an HPE and Mathematics teacher on the Sunshine Coast in Queensland, he is married to Haley and has three beautiful children Chelsea, Nathan and Ryan.