With thanks for the tip to Mister Evan Finn.

We here at elephantjournaldotcom write about green and mindfulness every day, and try and practice what we preach a little bit here and there, too. So it’s always surprisingly, in an awful way, to remember that most of the world that is America doesn’t give a shiite about Keeping America Beautiful—much less beginning to live in harmony with a world that we’re ultimately dependent upon.

And so I look at the small things. Do you use a plastic straw, when you could do without? Do you order your drink for here if you forget your to go cup? Do you bike or walk or bus when you can? Do you recycle that Pepsi can, or just drop it casually in the trash?

After all, you’re only as green—that is, caring for our children and children’s children—as the last time you hucked a spent butt at the pavement. Or, in the case of our Times Square LED-lit ball-dropping revelry, we’re only as green as the 40 tons of trash we produced while expressing how happy we were to mark the passage of another year.