Simple Living with Wanda Urbanska

Wanda's Diary Entries

Saturday, April 29, 2006

My friend Lisa Renstrom, the national president of the Sierra Club, was a guest speaker at Catawba College’s weekend celebration of Earth Day and its 10th anniversary last Saturday in Salisbury, NC. During a break from the wonderful music acts that made up “Earthstock” that were contributed to the day, Lisa gathered a group of students and community members around her in Keppel Auditorium and talked turkey about the environmental challenges we all face together. (Originally the event was to be held out of doors, but rain forced us inside.)

As the national elected head of the 750,000-member Sierra Club, Lisa is based in nearby Charlotte, NC. She has tried for years to live her life in a sustainable fashion. We interviewed and drove along with Lisa for the first show of our series as she steered her hybrid vehicle around the roads of Charlotte. On the program, Lisa told me that hers was the first hybrid vehicle purchased in the Queen City.

At Earthstock, the Nebraska-reared Renstrom had her lovely mother—who appears to be her best friend—with her. Lisa Renstrom was talking about the Sierra Club’s new focus on “smart energy solutions,” and how we could all reduce the demand for power by 30 percent if we “used the technological efficiencies” of today. She described about basic steps we can take, like insulating our homes through weatherization programs, exploring alternative fuels, such as biodiesel, and reducing our energy needs. “We need to start a massive mobilization effort as after World War II to enable us to move toward sustainability.”

With her casual blond hair and piercing baby-blue eyes, Lisa makes a wonderful, accessible advocate for change—for making change for the better. I left the program feel proud of what Lisa has accomplished and inspired by her commitment to make the world a better place.