Dawn Saves the Planet

Vanessa shot Mallory a grateful smile. “Right.”

  Mallory clapped her hands together. “Now, I think it’s time we had some lunch. Mom made PBJs for everybody before she left this morning.”

  “Hooray!” Claire cried. “I love peanut butter.”

  Jessi helped stack the letters in a neat pile on the sideboard, and then she and Mal led the group into the kitchen.

  “Uh-oh,” Nicky shouted as they entered the big family kitchen. “Water leak!” He pointed to the dripping kitchen faucet.

  Adam leapt forward. “Who should the Green Patrol arrest?”

  Mal rolled her eyes at Jessi. “I don’t think you need to arrest anybody,” she told Adam in her most patient voice. “I think you just need to make sure the faucet is completely turned off.”

  “I’ll do it,” Margo called, racing for the sink.

  “Maybe we should check all the faucets in the house,” Vanessa suggested. “Dawn told us that even the tiniest leaky faucet can lose up to three thousand gallons of water a year.”

  “How much is that?” Claire wondered.

  “She said that’s like drinking sixty-five glasses of water a day for a whole year.”

  “Wow!”

  The kids started at the kitchen sink and tried to imagine drinking that much water.

  “We better check out the rest of the house right away,” Adam declared with a worried frown. “We’ve got lots of faucets and showers.”

  Jessi grabbed his arm before he could leave the kitchen. “Lunch first. Then we can check the house, plus the spigots outside.”

  “Outside?” Jordan repeated.

  “Sure,” Jessi said. “Garden hoses can leak, too, you know.”

  The prospect of inspecting not just the house but outside, too, cheered everyone.

  Mal’s mother had set the sandwiches on a big plate on the counter. Next to them was a plastic baggie filled with celery and carrot sticks.

  “Uh-oh.” Nicky pointed to the baggie. “The Green Patrol may have to arrest Mom. She used plastic.”

  “Not so fast,” Mal said. “It’s not a waste. We can use this bag again. I’ll rinse it out and then put it in the dish drainer to dry. How does that sound?”

  Nicky and Vanessa exchanged looks, and then Vanessa said, “I guess that’s okay.”

  “What a relief,” Jessi murmured under her breath. Picking up a roll of paper towels, she said, “Okay, everybody, take your sandwiches to the table.”

  “Look out!” Jordan shouted. “Jessi’s going to waste paper. Green patrol!”

  Jessi pulled her hand back quickly. “If we can’t put our sandwiches on paper towels,” she asked Mallory, “what should we do about cleaning up crumbs, and wiping our mouths?”

  “I know!” Margo cried, “Let’s use real plates and cloth napkins.”

  Mallory smiled. “That’s using your head.”

  While the kids put their sandwiches on glass saucers, Jessi muttered under her breath, “Is it all right to give the kids glasses of milk to drink?”

  “Sure,” Mallory replied. “Why wouldn’t it be?”

  “I don’t know,” she said with a shrug. “Maybe milking cows is bad for the animals.”

  Mallory laughed. “The Green Patrol has really shaken you up, hasn’t it?”

  Jessi nodded her head. “I’m afraid to breathe. I might pollute the air.”

  After the kids ate lunch, they made a complete inspection of the house and yard. Several times Jessi and Mal made mistakes. Jessi found a soda can by the fence and threw it in the trash. She forgot to recycle. And Mallory left the light on in the kitchen. She was wasting energy. But the Green Patrol was right there to tell them about it.

  By the time Mr. and Mrs. Pike arrived home two hours later, the house and yard had been given a complete Green Inspection, and Jessi and Mal were totally exhausted.

  They had both been forced to attend Green school five times and, according to Jessi, “Once was more than enough!”

  I spent most of the week planning a recycling program for Stoneybrook Middle School. First I designed a poster listing reasons why SMS was the ideal site for a recycling center. Then I drew up a schedule for taking the cans and bottles to the main terminal downtown. I’d even made a chart of how many students would be needed to work on the project each week, and how many hours they would have to spend a month to keep the recycling center going.

  On Thursday I got up my courage to present my plan to Mrs. Gonzalez. After school, I went to her classroom and told her about it. Her response was better than I ever expected.

  “Dawn, that’s an excellent idea,” she said. “I’m really impressed.”

  “Thanks,” I said proudly. “When can we start? Tomorrow?”

  Mrs. Gonzalez laughed. “Not so fast. These things take time.”

  “But there isn’t any time,” I protested. “Every day the world gets covered with more and more garbage. You said so yourself.”

  Mrs. Gonzalez folded her hands in front of her on her desk. “I’m glad to see you’re so enthusiastic about this, and I have a feeling you could really make it work. But before we can start anything, Mr. Kingbridge will have to okay it.”

  My stomach did a flip-flop. Mr. Kingbridge was the vice-principal and a visit to his office was always pretty scary.

  “I’ll talk to him this afternoon.” Mrs. Gonzalez slid her chair back and stood up. “We’ll see if you can show him your presentation tomorrow.”

  “Great.” I swallowed hard.

  At home that night I practiced a speech over and over in front of the mirror. Then I performed it for Mary Anne and her kitten Tigger. At breakfast the next morning, I presented it to my mom and Richard. By the time I talked to Mr. Kingbridge that afternoon, I had memorized it completely.

  Mr. Kingbridge was sitting behind his big oak desk when Mrs. Downey, the school secretary, ushered me into his office. He gestured for me to sit down, then said, “Your teacher, Mrs. Gonzalez, is very impressed with you. She says you have an idea that will benefit not just our school but the whole town of Stoneybrook. Is that right?”

  I swallowed hard and croaked, “Yes, sir.”

  “Well.” Mr. Kingbridge leaned back in his chair and clasped his hands behind his head. “Tell me about it.”

  I decided to stand up to make my speech, because that’s how I had been practicing it. I was a little shaky at first (A little? My hands were quivering!) but after I showed him my poster and listed the reasons why SMS should be a recycling center, I started to calm down.

  “SMS is in a prime location for a recycling center — it’s only a few minutes walk from lots of neighborhoods,” I explained. “Having this center on our school grounds would train the students to be ecology-minded and they in turn would train their families.”

  Mr. Kingbridge nodded his head and leaned forward as I continued my presentation. After I showed him the work schedule, and the plans for transporting the cans and bottles to the main center, I announced in a clear, strong voice, “Mr. Kingbridge, this project will not only benefit the community by giving them a convenient location to recycle but it will also benefit our school. Just think of the hundreds of pieces of paper we use here every day that could easily be recycled. I bet our school cafeteria provides over a thousand cartons of milk a week to the students.”

  “That’s a lot of paper,” Mr. Kingbridge agreed.

  “And the teachers’ lounge has a soft drink machine. Those cans should be recycled. Why not let the students of SMS do something good for our school and our planet?”

  When I’d finished Mr. Kingbridge asked to look at my notebook once more. After studying it for a few minutes, he raised his head. “How much is this going to cost?”

  “It won’t cost anyone a thing, but time.”

  “What about the supplies?”

  “All we need are clearly labeled cardboard boxes that we can get free from grocery stores, and a dry place to store them.”

  “How about advertising?”

  “
We can make posters at my house and put them up around town.”

  “We?” Mr. Kingbridge arched his eyebrows. “Who’s we?”

  “The students at SMS.”

  Mr. Kingbridge stared at me for a moment. Then he got up from his desk and looked out his window, his hands behind his back. After what seemed like a million years, he said, “If you can prove to me that the students at SMS support you, and are willing to work very hard to make this project succeed …” (he paused and then smiled) “then I see no reason why you can’t start your recycling program.”

  “All right!”

  I shouted so loudly that the sound surprised even me, and I clapped my hand over my mouth.

  Mr. Kingbridge didn’t seem to mind. In fact, little smile lines formed around his eyes as he said, “This really is a worthwhile project, Dawn. I’ll give you a week and a half to drum up interest and then we’ll discuss it again. Good luck. I hope it works.”

  I was smiling so hard when I left Mr. Kingbridge’s office that my cheeks ached. All I had to do to get his okay was prove that the students at SMS were interested. That would be easy!

  That night I began my campaign. First I called everyone in the BSC and asked them to help me make posters and talk to the students. The next morning Mary Anne and I went to school early because I wanted to greet the students as they came in through the front doors.

  Mary Anne agreed to help hold my sign, which read: SMS NEEDS A RECYCLING CENTER. YOU CAN MAKE IT HAPPEN!

  The first person to come by was Erica Blum-berg from our homeroom. She was juggling her books and what looked like her breakfast — a small can of orange juice and half a piece of buttered toast. I caught her math book just before it hit the floor and tucked it back into her book bag.

  “Thanks,” she mumbled as she finished off the last bite of her toast.

  “Erica, I need your help,” I began. “I’m trying to start a recycling center here at school.”

  “What can I do?”

  “Pass the word to all your friends, and volunteer to be a helper when the project gets going.”

  “Sure,” Erica said as she took a final swig of her juice. “Just keep me posted.”

  She was about to toss the empty container in the trash can by the front door when I shouted, “Erica! Are you crazy?”

  Erica leaped back from the trash can as if a deadly snake were inside it. Her book bag slipped off her shoulder and clattered onto the floor. “What? What’s the matter?”

  I pointed to the can in her hand. “That’s an aluminum can. Never throw it away. It can be recycled.”

  “Oh. Sorry.” Erica turned in a confused circle, trying to figure out what to do with her can.

  “Look, I’ll take that for you,” Mary Anne offered as she picked up Erica’s book bag. “And when the school gets its own center, you can just drop it in the box.”

  “Oh, thanks, Mary Anne,” Erica said gratefully. She hurried down the hall and didn’t even look at me when she said, “I guess I’ll see you later.”

  Mary Anne turned to me and hissed, “Why did you shout at Erica like that?”

  “She was going to throw that can away,” I shot back. “Do you know how bad that is for the environment?”

  “Yes,” Mary Anne replied with an impatient sigh. “You’ve already told me a hundred times.”

  “Well, then you should have stopped her, too. Americans throw away sixty-five billion cans a year. Do you know how much garbage that is?” I hate to admit it but I was starting to get upset with Mary Anne. She didn’t seem to care as much as I did about what we were trying to do. “I thought you believed in recycling.”

  “I do, but I’m not going to yell at everyone just because they throw away one can or bottle,” Mary Anne said. “And you’d better be careful how you treat people, or they will turn against you and your idea. Here.”

  She shoved my poster into my hands and started to walk away.

  “Hey, where are you going?” I asked.

  “I’ve got to get to class early to finish some homework,” Mary Anne said without looking back.

  Now I was really confused. Mary Anne seemed upset with me, but she had no right to be. I was just doing my part to help save the environment.

  After Mary Anne left, I talked to about twenty more kids before the bell rang. Then I hurried down the hall to my locker, where I ran into Shawna Riverson. Her locker is next to mine, and it’s a pigsty (which is a big surprise, since she is always so perfect-looking). Anyway, when Shawna opened her locker, I swear, three plastic cups, some greasy wrappers from month-old hamburgers, and two yellow Styrofoam containers tumbled onto the hall floor. (Gag!)

  “You must live on burgers and fries,” I said as I watched her scoop up the debris.

  “Who can eat the food they serve here?” Shawna groaned. “They practically force me to go to Burger Town.”

  I watched as she shoved the Styrofoam containers, along with the rest of her trash, back in her locker. “Well next time you get a hamburger, tell them to just put it in a paper bag,” I told her. “Styrofoam is terrible for the environment.”

  “I’m sure,” she said sarcastically, “that two boxes are not going to hurt anybody.”

  I don’t know what came over me but suddenly I got really angry. “That’s permanent garbage. Don’t you understand? It’ll never go away. Those two containers will probably float around in the ocean and kill innocent sea turtles.”

  “Big deal.”

  Shawna shut her locker door and began walking down the hall. I followed her all the way to homeroom, trying to make her come to her senses. “It is a very big deal. Do you know that the chemicals used to make Styrofoam are ruining the ozone layer?” (I didn’t realize it but I was practically shouting.) “That causes the greenhouse effect, which is why the Northeast is having a drought right now, and why Texas is getting waterlogged.”

  “So tell them to get an umbrella,” Shawna said as we stepped into our homeroom.

  Several of the students in class laughed at her reply, which just made me even more angry. How could they laugh about something as important as the future of our world? I would have said something really nasty if the bell hadn’t rung.

  Mary Anne, who sits behind me in homeroom, tugged on my arm. “Calm down, Dawn,” she whispered. “Class is about to start.”

  I slumped down in my seat, feeling more convinced than ever that what I was doing was right.

  Claudia arrived at our Save the Planet class on Thursday completely out of breath. She told us that Charlotte had insisted on running the entire way. This was a very important day for our class because we were making our final preparations for the Green Fair and Charlotte wanted to make sure she didn’t miss a thing.

  The minute they walked in the door, I took charge.

  “Coats on the hooks in the hall,” I instructed. “Guests on the couch. And students check the assignment sheet posted by the kitchen door.” I clapped my hands together several times. “We’ve got a lot of things to do today so let’s not dawdle.”

  Stacey, who had been in the kitchen when Claudia first arrived, was a lot more casual. “Hi, Claud!” she called. “Can I get you something to drink? Juice or mineral water?”

  Claud shook her head. “Don’t worry about me. I’m going to be as quiet as a mouse, and just sit over here in the corner.”

  Stacey was carrying some sheets of poster board and a pack of colored markers in her hands as she stepped into the living room. “Did you see what Woody Jefferson and Trevor Sandbourne brought for lunch today?” she asked.

  Claudia had eaten with some friends on the other side of the lunch room. She leaned forward eagerly. “No. What?”

  “Brie cheese, paté, and a bottle of sparkling cider.”

  “You’re kidding!” Claudia gasped. “I can’t believe I missed this.”

  “They even spread out a red-and-white checkered tablecloth, and brought their own silver and a couple of wine glasses. Mrs. Ensign thought they were drink
ing real wine and nearly had a cow.” (Mrs. Ensign is a lunchroom monitor.)

  “Why’d they do it?” Claud asked.

  “To prove that we don’t have to eat Mystery Meat and pickled green beans to have a good lunch.”

  “Oooh, I bet that made Mrs. Ensign furious.”

  “Yeah,” Stacey giggled, “you should have seen her. Her face turned beet-red. Trevor said he thought he saw steam coming out of her ears.”

  “Excuse me?” I cut in on their conversation. “I don’t want to interrupt your gossip session, Stacey, but we do have a class to teach.”

  “Oops!” Stacey winced. “I’ll talk to you later, Claud.” She hurried over to the kids who were clustered around the assignment sheet chattering excitedly.

  “I’m with Charlotte at the shopping bag booth,” Becca Ramsey said to Stacey. “What’s that?”

  Stacey opened her mouth to reply but I answered for her (after all, the booth was my idea). “We want to encourage people not to use paper or plastic when they buy their groceries,” I explained. “We want them to bring their own bags. You two will be selling canvas shopping bags that you have decorated. You’ll also sell plain ones that people can decorate on their own.”

  “That sounds fun,” Charlotte said.

  “I want to be at the shopping bag booth, too,” Melody Korman added, pouting.

  Stacey knelt beside her and said, “All of the booths are fun. I’ve talked to Bloomer’s, the nursery on Spring Street, and they’ve agreed to donate small plants for the booth we would like you and Hannie to run.”

  “What do we do with the plants?” Melody asked.

  “You sell them,” I explained. “This is a very important booth. Not only does it raise money but it helps keep the world green.”

  A big smile lit up Melody’s face and turning to Hannie she exclaimed, “Our booth will be the best one at the whole fair!”

  “In the whole world!” Hannie replied.

  Stacey handed Melody some poster board. “Your assignment today is to make the sign for your booth.”

  Melody hurried over to a corner of the room, calling, “I’ll make the letters, Hannie, if you’ll draw a picture of a plant.”