Some days too many things click not to share them with the whole community. Do North Kitsap residents value the environment in which they have chosen to live? Or are there just a few “squeaky wheel do-gooders” who make it appear that the rest of the residents give a rip about our natural surroundings?

It’s something to ponder. And ponder it I did once again this week. For several reasons.

Despite all the pro-environment organizations in the North End — and truly you can’t swing an organically grown, hand woven hemp rope without hitting two or three members — it seems that there are those among us who would just as soon trash the region as call it home.

A perfect example came a few days ago when I got stuck behind a very slow moving truck and — living on a one-way loop in Hansville — opted to drive the wrong way out of my neighborhood. Anyway, one of my neighbors called me on it. What got me wasn’t the fact that I was being corrected for heading the wrong way (something, to my recollection, I had never done before) but rather that said neighbor had just let her large dog do his business on a nearby lawn and was walking away from the mess as she called attention to my mistake.

A few days later, I drove by freshly dumped fast food bags along Hood Canal Drive on my way to work where I read all about an elementary school environmental education program just a few miles up the road from the refuse at Foulweather Bluff. Ironic? You bet.

Either way, the bottom line here is there is hope for the future. The more folks work to teach area youth about preservation, the less likely they will be to take their environment for granted. All this education is bound to catch up with us. The old way of doing things will eventually die out and give way to an enlightened way of viewing our surroundings.

It may take awhile but it’ll come. I just hope I’m still around when it does.

JOE IRWIN

Editor