Title
Owen’s Story
Name
Owen
Place
Poconos, Pennsylvania
How are you sensing climate change?
The roar of waterfalls, the rustling of leaves, the chirping of birds, and the stillness of the mountain. I could only imagine how Bushkill falls—this beautiful nature-filled environment—would evolve with climate change and urbanization. In June of 2021, my family and I took a hiking trip to the Poconos. One day my mom exclaimed, “let’s go hiking”—neither my dad nor my brother agreed, but she was the boss of the house—and just like that, we drove 2 hours to Bushkill Falls. On the mountain, I could remember the colorful animals we saw, the soft flowing of streams, and the refreshing scent of nature. It was beautiful. Unfortunately, beauty wasn’t the only thing I saw. I also noticed the disrespect and blatant disregard shown towards nature. Almost every 10 minutes, I saw a vandalized tree, a stream polluted with trash, or a fallen tree. This isn’t the only instance I’ve seen of climate change and adverse human environmental effects. I traveled to Iceland in 2016 and Finland in 2019. There I saw mesmerizing glaciers, charming landscapes, and beautiful shores; however, when I see pictures of the places I visited now, almost everything is changed. A glacier I sat on in 2016 has now melted and washed into the sea, the beautiful snowy white landscapes are now diluted with the grass below, and the before stable waterfalls now run rampant, flooding the area around it. It pains me to see such beauties of the world just up and go in a few years; it makes me wonder if all the human advancement and growth is worth it. What of new technologies and inventions when we are destroying our ecosystem? Through all of this, I’ve started to recognize and notice the human impacts we have—especially I have had—on the environment.
How do these changes make you feel?
I’m scared for where humans are leading this world, I’m worried about the future of our planet and our own future. It obvious that if we don’t make a change now, it would only come bite us in the ass in the future.
Poconos, Pennsylvania
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