IS THIS REALLY WHAT WE WANT?

Climate change can control us f e w se Written by: Addi Holt

Have you ever stopped to think about how your everyday activities could affect so many things in good or even bad ways? When you look around you what do you see? Well, you could say people or a home, or the city/community it could be anything just depending on where you are at. But some things, visible or not, are always there. For example, no matter where you go there is always an ecosystem where living or nonliving things interact, and this is where climate change falls into this category. Climate change, when you think of it, is not a one singular visible object rather it is an idea, but the factors or outcomes of it are visible and that causes problems in the world we live in. So let us begin on this topic that affects the people in the world you live in. Oh, and hello my name is Addi Holt and today I have brought you all together to talk about a topic that our ENTIRE world right now is facing whether you know it or not. We will be discussing climate change. Climate change is a big thing that the world faces today and what we do about it can affect the world we live in. It is the factor of change in temperature and weather change due to many causes. Mainly causing more severe weather and rising temperatures. That each day because of climate change glaciers and ice begin to melt more frequently and a lot quicker. Also, as the glaciers begin to melt more and more from rising temperatures the oceans begin to rise and expand taking more and more of our land away. Already the global temp has increased 0.85℃ and by 2100 the oceans will have gained over 40-60 CM. It is also threatening developmental processes too. It is also causing natural disasters to worsen, which is very harmful to humans and the environment we live in. As climate change gets worse the air quality will also begin to worsen which puts many living things at risk. As you may have noticed all over the world you have seen more frequent natural disasters happen especially in the U.S. For example, hurricanes and wildfires have been seen around a lot more than usual, and are now continuously getting more dangerous as climate change worsens. With all of the factories, gas-powered cars, construction and believe it or not wildfires our air quality begins to plunge down putting our living closer and closer to risk. Even if we were to try to solve the problem it would take at least 20-30 years to recover to even somewhere close to the normal or average air quality. It is a threat that has no borders and could harm us all. If we do not take care of our world then all of these things will continue to worsen causing bigger problems in the future. So next time you go outside into the world, look around and see if you could maybe help. Climate change is a big thing that the world faces today. It is the factor of change in temperature and weather change due to many causes but we humans can help and restore the world we live in if we all put our heads to it. Thank you all for taking time out of your day to listen to the words of my opinion and maybe you yourself can do the same and can help put an impact on the dangers we face with climate change.

Written by: Addi Holt

————————————————————————————— CREDITS*********** Source 1: https://www.un.org/en/global-issues/climate-change Source 2: https://www.usaid.gov/climate/landing-content —————————————————————————————

As he sped his way to work he was pulled over and given his millionth ticket this week, because he was rich he would just pay his way out of things. Many of the citizens did not think that this was fair and that he needed to learn how it felt to be like them. When he made it to work he walked into his office with a couple of grumpy workers awaiting him. They were furious by his selfish lazy acts. When he left the office last week he left everything running with only one thing done so now their company was behind. Tim lashed out and threw the table. It was not indeed his fault and he told the workers that it's their problem and that they need to solve it. When in fact it was not. He complained that they give him to much work and that he is there all day so when he finally leaves he is too tired to turn anything off so he just leaves. Yet again everything was blamed on the workers, not himself. And on this specific day, he was fired. He had lost his job and now had to head home in shame. Fast forward to a couple of weeks later it was time to pay his bills. When he goes to hit enter it quickly pops up with invalid and says he doesn't have enough. What! Not enough? Thats impossible. Suddenly tim started to freak out. How could this happen? He walked downstairs to find a crowd of people in front of his door. As he walked outside there was so many people surrounding him, with big signs, cameras, and microphone all protesting about, him! As he made his way down the steps of his home the people, still staring, began to circle around him. All he wanted to know is what he did wrong. The people began to share their feeling on how tim has been acting. How they feel he does things carelessly and doesnt care about their environment. They wanted him to feel how they feel and wanted him to learn his lesson. That not every problem is someone elses fault and that its ok to take the blame. Not only that but to be wise about how they treat the environment. Tim was always carelessly leaving things on, littering, and doing things that damage the environment causing things especially like climate change. The people wanted to put a stop to it. They thought that he should learn his lesson by being put on a tight budget and doing the community a favor and helping take care of their environment. Then he would know what it feels like to be an average citizen. When Tim was given these tasks he realized how hard people work and how careless he was acting he learned so much on how to care and provide for the environment avoiding making climate change worse.

“Help Don’t Hurt”

Written by: Addi Holt

It was yet again another weary day for John Timothy Roseene, although he prefers to be called tim. The day consists of the same things he does every day, wake up, be rich, act rich, and feel rich. Even though Tim was rich he still worked, not very hard, just because he was greedy for more money. He woke up this morning to a quiet and lonely house like he does every morning, he turned his shower on and went downstairs to turn on every light in his house so he feels a little brighter. He turned on the stove to cook himself a gourmet meal but then remembered the shower was still running. He trotted upstairs and to the shower. After a nice long hour and a half shower, he decided to get ready for work. Keep in mind he was supposed to be there 20 minutes ago. As he got ready he threw on his nicest blue coat and his shinest shoes just to show off and impress the others at work. He headed downstairs. Realizing that the stove was still on he went ahead to cook some breakfast before he left. Just before he was about to leave he got a great idea. If he was already 45 minutes late why not be an hour late? So he quickly made his way to the couch and sat his bum down to watch some tv. After checking the clock he jumped up in shock! It had been an hour! He rushed to the powder room to fix his hair, left the sink running, and ran out of the door.

Here and there, everywhere. As the sun's smile begins to fade, The earth feels so lifeless at times. Problems we face and share. As the trees begin to lose their shade, Like it has lost hope over time. But we never show a little care. When human life disrupts earth’s zen, What have we done to our earth? The earth must ask how is this fair? Will the earth ever thank us again? A little care won't hurt. Climate change is everywhere. Or will it never forget the decisions we made? Lend your hand, That is up to humankind to fix and repair. Share your care, The earth must prepare. So the earth won't have to ask, how is this fair? Or earth will ask how is this fair?

_____________________________________________________________________________________ This poem is about awareness of your surroundings and how to take care of the earth to prevent things like climate change from happening. Most of the time we get all caught up in ourselves and do not realize that the things we are doing can harm our environment. Often more times than others many will deny their wrongs and believe that they are not the problem, continuing to point fingers at others. It is also about the fight against climate change and the struggles the world faces and how we humans have to be the earth's friends and help take care of what we started. I included foreshadowing in stanza one line 7. It reads, “The earth must prepare.” this is an example of foreshadowing because it is a warning for what is to come in the future without explaining what is actually going to happen. It contributes to the theme because if we do not help our earth recover and stop climate change then the earth must prepare for much worse in the future. I also included personification in stanza two lines 1 and 2. They read “As the sun's smile begins to fade, As the trees begin to lose their shade” this is an example of personification because it is giving the trees and the sun lifelike characteristics to help describe feeling they might have if they had human-like characteristics. This contributes to the theme because since many are not helping the earth is starting to lose its character and things are beginning to fade or worsen. Lastly, I included imagery in stanza three line 1. It reads “The earth feels so lifeless at times.” this is an example of imagery because it is using one of the 5 senses to describe what the earth is like. This contributes to the theme because the earth is not like it once was and not in a good way. This is my poem about climate change!

Written by: Addi Holt

I love parties. They are about the only place where I felt like I fit in. Luckily this week was spring break and nobody was going anywhere because of the hurricane coming up next week. My mom is worried, this was our 4th one this year. She cares a little too much about our environment and climate change. Exactly why I have to ride my bike everywhere and don't have a car. Our house is full of recycled decorations from trash on the beach. And my mom believes in eco-friendly things. When I was five we were quite poor so for my 5th birthday she made me a ring out of plastic waste. That's about the only bit of trash that I find special. As much as I hate my mom I still worry about her being alone at home by herself all of the time. I try to make it back in time to eat the dinner she works hard making every night and then I go straight to bed so that in the morning I can run off again. One day my mom stopped me before I could get out the door. I'm tired, so tired of her. Her presence makes me so frustrated. We fought for a good hour and a half. But she made a point that I could quite let go of. Would I ever be proud that my childhood life was the trash that could never be fixed? The next day I felt horrible for what I had ever said about my mom. All she was doing was trying to help. I guess when you sleep on problems you become more open about them when you wake up. I walked downstairs to my mom sleeping on the couch with a bowl of popcorn on her lap. I picked up her mess, and (I) tucked her in before I left the house. Even after our fight I still wasn't going to give up parties, they were my life. At least I thought at the moment. I was late for the party so I decided to sneak up on everyone. Before I jumped out to scare them I was watching what they were doing. They were beating up some kid that had tried to join and was stealing all of his stuff. How awful, why would they do that? Right before I went to confront them they left leaving all of their trash behind. That's it I have had enough. I ran back to my house as it started to pour. When I walked in my mom was still sleeping so I quietly grabbed a jacket boots and a hat to cover up my identity. I went around looking for the boy, but I couldn't find him. As I looked around at all of the litter and cars and horrible things for the environment, I started to get why my mom loved the world without those things in it. It was sad to see our environment like this. Climate change will continue to worsen and I don't want that. I started to clean up when I ran into the boy. His name was zain. He was looking for his stuff when he ran into me. Luckily they had left his stuff too along with their litter. He quickly grabbed his stuff and scattered off with a scared look. The feeling inside me imagined people being scared of me instead of wanting to be friends with me. That's it I'm giving my friends up

“The Beauty in Fixing” (pt.1)

Written by: Addi Holt

Well, it's another day that I live. I woke up and headed straight towards the beach. Also ignoring my mom’s calls from the door. I live in the Outer Banks, just me my mom, and occasionally my older brother Seth, but he is not usually in the picture. I ran as fast as my feet could take me. Normally I would ride my bike, but that was taken away by my mom in order to prevent me from going to the beach. Like I cared. My mom and I used to have the greatest bond just me and her. That didn't last long because when I turned 16 she didn't like me making my own choices and being independent. She claimed what I was doing was throwing my life away. She's not wrong all I do is skip school go to parties and hang out with friends. But she too also threw her life away, going to school, helping the environment, getting coffee with friends, and shopping. I'm sorry but boring. I want to be like the cool kids and fit in. Finally, now I get that chance and my mom taking it away.

I told my mom everything. Every last word. In some way, she understood all of my problems. We talked for hours and actually laughed together for once. This is it, home is my happy place and my mom is my greatest friend. Yes, I did lose all of my other friends but I turned my trashy situations into right, just like my mom turned trash into beauty. It would take a long time to fix all of my mistakes, especially with all of the school I missed, but I knew in the end it would all work out. Believe it or not, it did. I ended up graduating and making a whole ton of new friends, I was in a lot of environmental clubs and my mom and I worked against climate change! In the end, anything is fixable.

“The Beauty in Fixing” (pt.2)

Written by: Addi Holt

I decided to show up at the party a couple of days later. Everyone seemed livid all because the little boy ratted them out. They were also mad about something else. A person, someone who cleaned up their mess and helped the boy. You want to know why they were mad because they believed it was me. At first, I got scared, but I then realized that I don't care. These friends were not made for me and they are not good for the environment. So I gave them up. I walked up and turned myself in. Yes, indeed it was me. I ran home and walked in the door. My mom saw the expression on my face and pulled me into a big hug. I could have cried for hours