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Letter: My journey from climate awareness to climate activism

Sudbury grandmother's describes her journey to awareness
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A local grandmother is trying to do what she can about climate change. (File)

I am a wife, a mother of three and grandmother of four. Besides staying at home to raise my children for a few years, I also spent some years in the health-care system, then eventually retired from a career in clinical social work.

Over the last 10 to 15 years, I have become incrementally aware of the impact of our changing climate. It all started with a close friend in Ottawa becoming politically involved with the Green Party. 

Then a daughter spoke about her patients in Nunavut complaining about their increasing difficulty in securing their traditional means of survival as their hunting and fishing seasons shortened with ice melting earlier in the spring and freezing later in the fall. This climate change is getting serious, I thought to myself. People's traditional grocery store is closing and there is nothing they can do about it.

The knock-knock on my door of awareness grew louder this year. Two of my three kids have been directly hit in the pocketbook by the Ottawa flood and the downpours in Toronto. 

Most of all, it breaks my heart to know that my precious, innocent grandsons face a lifetime of the economic, health, social and emotional impacts of climate change.

So, up until this year, I had assuaged my growing guilt over my lack of engagement in addressing climate change by making a few changes. My husband and I switched to LED light bulbs and took advantage of the Government of Canada's Energy Insulation Grant to insulate our basement and buy an energy efficient furnace and a heat pump.

I knew this helped a bit, but when my Ottawa friend mentioned the Citizens’ Climate Lobby, I decided to go online and do some research. I liked that they were lobbyists and not activists. Having no experience in this kind of stuff, I was encouraged that part of their mission was to teach ordinary people how to exercise their personal and political power.

I connected with Cathy Orlando, the Canadian national director of Citizens Climate Lobby and with her ongoing support and encouragement this winter, I learned how to write, send and get a few letters-to-the-editor published in different newspapers. How empowering to learn this new skill.

But the crème de la crème for me in terms of learning to be a caring, impactful citizen happened on Friday, June 16. I accepted an invitation to lobby my Nickel Belt MP, Marc Serré, in his Val Caron office. 

It was a true eye-opener to witness both parties openly, generously, respectfully exchange concerns, knowledge and information. I left super pumped that Mr. Serré displayed genuine interest in working ever more closely with CCL, and he obviously appreciated our encouraging response to the June 2017 RNNR Committee Report "De-Risking the Adoption of Clean Technology In Canada's Natural Resources Sector.” 

I finally truly understood the importance of constituents when he described what further actions and information he needed from us to improve his work for us. I got it down in my bones that an MP works for his constituents, so the constituents have to let him know what their concerns are via letters to the editor, visits to his office, etc. For some reason, I had spent the bulk of my adult years doubting that I could make a political difference. What a mistake that was.

All this to say that it took many baby steps towards eventually lobbying my MP in person. It is an energizing, encouraging, empowering journey, one I would lobby anyone to take (pardon the pun).

Carole Lavallée
Chelmsford