In reality it was an exercise in futility. But in the eyes of a six-year old, it was the best line of defense we could muster. To help you appreciate what was at stake, close your eyes for a moment and try to conjure up the image of a tattered, split-rail fence. Much of it is overgrown with waist-high blades of grass and other vegetation. The wood has a discolored, slate gray patina to it and several of the rails are either splintered, broken, or both. A few have one end disengaged from the post, and now stretch down to touch the ground at a sharp angle. The rest, if they're still intact, are severely compromised, unable to support even the weight of a 45-pound kid, like me.

The fence lies virtually undisturbed, far removed from man-made influences of any kind. The only thing you're conscious of is the earth beneath your feet. Soft winds caress your skin and sunlight warms your spirit. You peer through the rails, careful not to jar one of them loose. On the other side of the fence, largely obscured by the tall reeds of grass, you notice knee-high bushes set in somewhat even, orderly rows. Butterflies and dragonflies dance in the air above them. If you're quiet and remain still you're bound to see a rabbit hop by or some field mice scurry about. Grapefruit-size mounds of dirt, camouflaged by fallen vegetation, hide burrows for small rodents. Out of the corner of your eye you catch a small animal dart across the ground and disappear under a bush. That's when you notice the robust red fruit, bright and luscious, hanging less than a foot off the ground. Many of them look like they're about to snap off the vine under their bulging weight. You breathe deep and take in the sweet fragrance of ripe strawberries. You ease through the rails, laying just a finger or two on the fence, keeping a close eye on your sneaker all the way down till it touches the ground. Moments later, the prize - sweet, delicious strawberries, are yours for the taking.

As a young child I spent much of my time there, frolicking about, not a care in the world. Like most rewards in life, the journey was difficult. That's because the strawberry patch lay at the far end of the Great Woods. Which was a seemingly impenetrable forest with nothing but massively firm trees stretching up to touch the sky; thick underbrush masking the ground, making passage difficult. If you strained your eyes, you'd pick up one of the dozens of twisty, interconnected paths, carved out long before my time. They all seemed to go somewhere. But one wrong turn and you could be lost for hours, maybe even past sundown. Which was the scariest thought imaginable. I knew how to unravel the intricate paths. This was my playground. I'd been taught by those I looked up to, bigger kids in the neighborhood, how to read the terrain and negotiate the trails that to an amateur were indistinguishable.

And it was their lead that prompted me to join in and stand up against the forty-ton "dragons"  that came to claim our sanctuary. Armed with small sticks and twigs, which we threw in defiance. Few, if any, reached their target. Nonetheless, we thought our action would be enough to drive them away, to convince them to leave our woods undisturbed. Standing alongside eleven and twelve year-olds - near adults in my eyes - we watched in horror as trees were toppled, then dragged behind the behemoth yellow, metal-clawed, roaring, "smoke-breathing" machines to a smoldering mound of trunks, branches, and bushes. I watched helplessly as our forest and all my childhood memories went up in smoke. I later learned that this was "progress"; more homes and more people. Progress, I soon found out, seldom meant better.

Forty years later I'm still trying to protect our forests, as well as the Earth's myriad ecosystems. This time I'm armed with knowledge and an array of devices that will help preserve the Earth's natural resources for tomorrow's child. I hope that tomorrow's child is lucky enough to stumble upon a strawberry patch of their own and marvel, as I did, at the intricate web of life found there. And be struck by the magnificence of its simple, natural beauty. I hope to inspire tomorrow's child sufficiently to not only protect that strawberry patch, but to think about all of the Earth's fragile ecosystems that lie beyond.

Why should we worry so much about the environment, you might wonder, when the world's economy is floundering, groups of people are killing others by the thousands, and children are starving to death by the millions? There is one simple but overriding reason: Despite multi-trillion "galactic" odds stacked in our favor that there might be another star somewhere in the universe capable of harboring a planet with the same life-sustaining conditions as Earth, there is near-conclusive evidence that we will never find such a planet. Therefore planet Earth is the only home we will ever have. If we screw it up, we can't migrate to another planet and start over.

I can accept that truth, you might say, but what does it have to do with me? It's not just you. It's you and the six billion other people who inhabit Earth whom, in varying and in very disproportionate degrees, are taxing the environment exponentially. Consider this: "If the evolution of the universe was compressed into a 24-hour day, our solar system, the Milky Way, would not have formed until 6:00 p.m. Primitive life on Earth would not have developed before 8:00 p.m., and human beings would not have appeared until just ten seconds before midnight. More amazing, is that with just the blink of an eye we would have traveled through the entire Industrial Revolution (1850 - present)." (1) Therein lies the problem. During this "blink of an eye" period, in our insatiable quest to "better" our lives, man has severely and irreparably, it seems, compromised his existence by undermining the very fabric that gives us life: our intricate and fragile environment.

Blue skies and sparkling mountain streams belie actual planetary conditions. The problems are growing exponentially, and most people continue to ignore the cancerous problem that will doom tomorrow’s child and every generation beyond, if we don't take collective action.

If they only understood how simple, un-encumbering, and in many cases, cost-savings the steps that need to be taken are, we could rewrite our future. The key is that everyone, unless they have a personal spaceship that will take them to their own Planet of Eden, must do their part to safeguard our planet for the sake of tomorrow’s child. What’s needed is not rocket science. It can start with something as simple as changing a single incandescent light bulb to a compact fluorescent light bulb – which can save you more than $90 over it’s 10,000-hour life.  

Think of tomorrow’s child, who you may have picked strawberries with a one point, and make a positive chance in their world. You may only be one person, but you have no excuse for not contributing to the solution and doing what you can to leave a better world for them. 

My life's work is to protect and preserve the Earth's ecosystems while helping to minimize the destructive impact of manmade influences on our environmental landscape. In the process, I hope to sufficiently inspire others to adopt a more benevolent lifestyle as they come to appreciate what a unique gift planet Earth is. And to that end, to understand how each and every one of us can and must do more to protect and preserve our planet.

CrunchTime Environmental Conservation Fundraisers is the vehicle for change. Our children must be the agents of change to carry out that mission, armed with tools that will conserve our finite natural resources when promulgated to the masses. Environmental Stewardship is a lesson that'll last a lifetime, and by instilling it in our students they can help create a sea change of benevolent conservatism that will endow the world.

CrunchTime is launching this campaign designed to save humanity from self-annihilation; in a sense, from using and loving the planet to death! By employing the latest technology that can reach virtually every human being simultaneously, we are embarking on a very low-tech quest to alter the direction of our potentially ruinous course. It will not be easy, but a more worthy endeavor has never been contemplated. To learn what you can do to help this cause, please read some or all of the issues confronting us, and follow as many of the suggestions under "Things that you can do" that accompany each commentary.

Carey S. Buttfield                            
Managing Partner
CrunchTime