You’ve all seen the heartbreaking photos.

A majestic polar bear, while desperately searching for seals on the Arctic island of Svalbard, collapsed to the tundra and called it a day. At that point, the polar bear looked like a rug.

I have no doubt that this story will be largely ignored. Many people will go about their day as if nothing happened. And why not? We live in a strip mall construct. Our thoughts focus on point a to point b to point c in this concrete vortex. What’s the big deal about a starving polar bear way in the middle of nowhere, with the hard Arctic wind at its back, and a few sea birds screeching about? What does this have to do with how much it costs me to fill up my car, buy groceries, or pick up my kids at soccer practice?

That’s why I’m proposing that a mock-up be made of this special polar bear. Actually, thousands of mock ups. It should be funded by the pentagon because it is a national security issue. Every day for the next year, one of these starved, mock-up polar bears should be placed in someone’s freaking driveway, so they are are forced to look at it, forced to have the emaciated bear occupy their thoughts as they figure out how to move the damn thing or get around it (at last Johnny has a use for his 4WD).

We tend not to pay attention until it hits us in the wallet or shows up in our yards. We go and buy that 10 MPG SUV when the 30 MPG sedan will do.

Today, a hungry bear died, far, far in the north.

There was nothing insignificant about it. Especially when your great grand kids ask where the glaciers went. Or where the polar bears went, or where the wolves went, or the wolverine, or the bees (and thus our crops) or who knows how many species. And at some point, somewhere down the line, a desperate, hungry generation will trudge upon this Earth much in the same way that polar bear trudged upon Svalbard Island. And they too, will collapse to their mother, evermore.