Dearest Elena (Moonpie),
This month’s holiday is even more special because this is the first time our Conversations have talked about Earth Day. It is on April 22nd every year. It’s such a special holiday because it honors our planet that we also call Mother Earth. Our book is My Friend Earth by Patricia MacLachlan.
It begins: “My friend Earth wakes from a winter nap.” This shows how our friend Earth looks at the animals as they spring to life – crows; spiders spinning their silver webs, the albatross crossing the sea, the mole, and chimpanzee, helping the baby zebra find her mother. She then tends to the prairie and the tundra where the reindeer are. Earth is caring for the animals and watching over them. Earth Day reminds us to honor and recognize the beloved relationship between her and all living things.
Earth provides food for us to eat, sunlight that allows us to see more clearly, water needed for our bodies to function, and the plant life that gives us the oxygen we breathe every second. It also protects us by providing all the trees and beautiful flowers and grass you always point out to me on our walks, my dear Moonpie. On Earth Day, we recognize how we have to give back to earth by conserving all of the resources she gives us. We see how we cannot abuse the fact that we are given water, wind, light, and heat. We have to protect Earth just as she protects us.
How do we do that, you ask? We make our best efforts to not pollute her waters and not contribute to the extinction of animals because of our actions.
The book talks about the four seasons. In the summer, Earth pours summer rain to fill streams and allow for water flow from the mountains to the fields and finally the sea. In the Winter there is snow, and My Friend Earth gives the bear a cave for hibernation. She provides Spring sun which melts the snow, grows flowers, and ushers in Spring showers which create those beautiful rainbows you so love. In the Fall there is wind and the leaves fall to the ground providing protective ground cover. You see, Mother Earth provides for all this activity every year and nothing on Earth could be without it.
She is called Mother Earth because she provides everything we need to live just as a mother provides everything for her children when they are born. Every morning when you crawl into bed with Daddy and me and grasp my hand, I think about how I need to protect you. Earth Day is all about honoring this very special, eternal relationship exactly like yours and mine. With Earth, however, everything alive is involved. Isn’t that wonderful? That includes all the plants and animals as small as ants and sand, and as large as the whales and mountains.
I hope when you celebrate Earth Day you remember what an important role you play in preserving this gorgeously giving planet of ours. Happy Earth Day, Moonpie.
Love Always,
Mommy
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