Nature & mother earth has always been such a big part of my life. My mum’s always said I was running around naked outside in puddles in the garden since I was about 3 and you just couldn’t get me out of water. I was very blessed to grow up in the North Yorkshire countryside and to be surrounded by nature and fields constantly. Pretty much every song we’ve written my lyrics have some metaphor for nature and the earth in there somewhere. The earth is an incredibly mind blowing place that we take for granted every single day.
I think the wonderful Earth Friendly Rocker (aka the Rock Fairy) has put it perfectly today in that whilst your inbox might be full of ~eco~ brands offering discount codes, one of the most damaging things for the earth is over consumption. Blows my mind that people don’t think about how many single use items they use, how much food they waste, buying clothes new instead of secondhand, the fact that people still LITTER? Like.. what? Also, when you go to a supermarket and there’s the option of buying a pack of 6 oranges in a plastic net vs buying 6 oranges without any packaging… why wouldn’t you just buy the ones without packaging? They’re cheaper too!
One of the songs on our EP (to be released later in the year) is called Magic At Our Fingertips and is about my constant confusion at the state of the world and why some people just aren’t bothered to do anything to help change. To me, especially with people that have children, surely you would want to do your bit and help improve the climate for future generations to come? We can’t even say “well I don’t care, it’s not going to affect me”, cos unfortunately it already is.
Lyrics from Magic at our Fingertips:
“Do you want to be around when the seas overflow?
Do you want to deal with the fires burning down your homes?
We can all make this go away
Just know it doesn’t have to be perfect
We all have magic at our fingertips”
Ps if you want to hear my vocal take live from the studio then head on over to the Scruffy Bear Fan Club on Facebook!
I think a huge problem is people think recycling and being more eco-conscious so much more difficult and inconvenient than it actually is. If everyone has the same idea of “well if everyone isn’t doing it then how am I going to make a change?” then nothing will improve. We need everyone doing it imperfectly, not a finite amount of people doing it perfectly. Being eco-conscious doesn’t have to mean having cold showers (or not showering at all - lol). It can be making sure you have a reusable water bottle instead of buying plastic ones every couple of days. If you don’t like tap water, buy a charcoal filter from Black & Blum and don’t use plastic brita filters. Shopping at charity shops, eBay or depop for clothes instead of buying from large clothing retailers - again, it’s cheaper! Trying to buy locally made gifts, food, produce because often they don’t have a load of plastic packaging and haven’t travelled miles to get into your sticky little mits. I bloody love avocados but I’ve just stopped buying them at this point. They’re a ridiculous food to try and sell in the UK. They will never be as nice and eating something that has travelled all the way from (often South America) that has a shelf life of about 3 days just isn’t worth it in my eyes.
So much of the blame is put on individual consumers. Yes, we most definitely are a HUGE part of it, but huge corporations are responsible for such a massive part of the world’s waste. I would go into way more detail about this cos I hate a huge percentage of big companies but we’d truly be here all day. So, if you’re interested give this a read: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/oct/09/revealed-20-firms-third-carbon-emissions
Thank you for listening to my ramblings, I have no idea what I’m talking about but damn I’m so passionate about the earth and trying to keep nature & wildlife by our sides. Especially as the four of us we’re blessed to live in the beautiful North Yorkshire countryside 🌳🌱🌿
Love y’all, say thanks to that little piece of land your house, school, workplace or favourite place to walk/visit is today. Gratitude, kindness and a bit of elbow grease will get us all through this.
Georgy x