Acting Individually and Together — It’s What We Must Do to Protect Our Community
Every day you share your stories with the Community Climate Collaborative about how you are taking individual action in your homes, your businesses, and your schools to address climate change. Those actions, joined with others, are magnified to create a much larger impact and inspire yet more action.
Our response to this global pandemic requires a similar response. We can all, as individuals, help to protect our community by staying at home, telecommuting, and limiting our exposure to others and to those most vulnerable to the COVID-19 virus. I am heartened to hear the stories of those who are doing just that.
Also, like climate change, we cannot forget about those who will be disproportionately impacted by this pandemic - the care-givers, grocery store clerks, small business owners, low-income and hourly workers, those who are food insecure, homeless people, those struggling with depression and anxiety, and of course, the elders of our community whom we often look to in uncertain times.
We are heartened to witness how the Charlottesville and Albemarle community is finding new ways to respond, support others, and connect while sheltering in place. C3 will be looking for ways to do the same. Our staff will be working from home researching climate action strategies for small cities, continuing our engagement programs, and finding new opportunities to be a resource for you. We want to help the parents who are searching for science activities to keep children engaged and lessen their anxiety about the world. We want to provide resources to help you reduce your energy costs while you stay at home to protect your community. We will also be sharing ways that other nonprofits and leaders are responding to provide comfort, food, healthcare, and financial relief.
Climate change, and many other issues will also require new ways of thinking and working together. Let’s share our successes now so we can replicate those for this and future challenges. Thank you for being an inspiring community to serve.
I came across this beautiful sentiment which I hope will provide you with some comfort in the days ahead.
“And the people stayed home. And read books, and listened, and rested, and exercised, and made art, and played games, and learned new ways of being, and were still. And listened more deeply. Some meditated, some prayed, some danced. Some met their shadows. And the people began to think differently.”
"And the people healed. And, in the absence of people living in ignorant, dangerous, mindless, and heartless ways, the earth began to heal.”
"And when the danger passed, and the people joined together again, they grieved their losses, and made new choices, and dreamed new images, and created new ways to live and heal the earth fully, as they had been healed."
~Kitty O'Meara
Yours in community,
Susan Kruse