Protecting ‘God’s Country’

To the Editor:

People call this place where we live “God’s Country”. The lush green forests, clear deep waters of Lake Superior, and the perfectly blue sky in the summer are exceptionally beautiful. My favorite outdoor activities are gardening perennials and vegetables, walking down a dirt road through the forest with my dogs, and sitting on the beach looking for Lake Superior agates. Amazingly, I was able to be on the beach every month this past winter for the first time. As great as that sounds it didn’t feel right. I wonder as the Native Americans, in another 7 generations, will this Lake Superior area show that we cared and that we were responsible for our actions? 

In other words, will our generation be thanked or cursed? Lake Superior is the largest fresh water lake in the world by surface area. It is also one of the fastest warming lakes in the world, warming 1 degree per decade since 1980. Average wind speeds have been increasing 5 percent each decade since 1980. And Superior has been pounded by three 500-year and one 1,000-year storm events in the past eight years.

You can go to https://climatehero.me and calculate your carbon footprint and then see what you can do to make a difference. 

Sometimes it seems futile, but if we all work together with hope and action, future generations will be able to continue to call the Lake Superior area “God’s Country” too.

Mary Meierotto

Bayfield