Cindy A. Matthew Returns to Ohio

I returned to Ohio in 2013 after thirty years of living in the west. It's challenging to return home after such a long time away--you can't help but compare things. I grew up in the rural northwestern corner of the state, which was then populated by friendly folks living in farm towns and cities filled with auto-industry related factories. Nowadays, most of the family farms are gone, it seems, and the cities are waning as well as factories are shuttered due to overseas competition.

So, what's the biggest difference I observed from the Ohio I remember from my childhood and the Ohio I live in today? The biggest difference can be found in the biggest natural feature of the state. The beautiful blue waters of Lake Erie are now tainted every summer with toxic blue-green algae blooms that cause "Don't touch!" warnings to be posted for our drinking water along with swimming and fishing bans. This is definitely not the "Beautiful Ohio" (the name of our state song) where I grew up!

As a proud Buckeye, I'm not about to let our beloved lake remain in its current sorry state. This past year I joined with others and worked on bringing about the first Rights of Nature law passed in the United States, the Lake Erie Bill of Rights. "LEBOR," as we call it for short, gives Ohio citizens the right to make those who would pollute our lake responsible for cleaning up their own messes and paying for it out of their pockets--not the taxpayers'.

Not many people realize that Lake Erie is the source for drinking water for over 11 million people in the U.S. and Canada. It's important we stop the CAFOs (or "feedlots" where thousands of cattle, hogs and chickens are contained within a very small area) from pouring their wastes directly onto the fields where it eventually washes into our scenic creeks and rivers and then into Lake Erie. Once these agricultural wastes pour into our lake, they become a super-food for microscopic blue-green algae, multiplying the algae beyond all imagination.

Unfortunately, these massive algal blooms produce toxins that are potentially lethal to both humans and animals. Our current government agencies don't seem to be able to stop the pollution, either. The factory farms and their supporters fought us every step of the way as we worked to place LEBOR on the ballot, and they are currently trying to overturn our citizens' initiative in court. They have very deep pockets, but we will not be defeated. After all, it is our lake and we drink from it, as well as boat, swim and fish in it. Proud Ohioans will not be bullied by polluters!

My love of nature and organic gardening has found its way into my fiction writing in my latest romance from eXtasy Books (written under my Celine Chatillon pen name), What Money Can't Buy. Francesca is a city girl who takes a summer internship at Bouncing Butterfly, a Midwestern eco-village. There she discovers her love of nature brings her a better understanding of the handsome veterinarian Callan and of herself as a person. Francesca learns there are some things in life that money can't buy, and those are the ones worth keeping.

https://www.extasybooks.com/978-1-4874-2347-6-what-money-cant-buy/

I've learned that lesson, too, since returning home. Lake Erie still has some wonderful natural tourist destinations. It is teaming with aquatic birds as well as deer and other wildlife.  Ohio has more than its share of scenic meandering streams and some big hills and forests in the southeastern corner and along the majestic Ohio River Valley. Of course, Ohio has plenty of nightlife in its famous "3-C" cities: Columbus, Cleveland and Cincinnati. But there's also Toledo, the city where I live, located at the mouth of the Maumee River, the largest watershed in the entire Great Lakes system. Toledo has a first class art museum, an award-winning zoo and the National Museum of the Great Lakes (complete with a humungous retired freighter, the James M. Schoonmaker, open for you to explore). Along with its many area parks featuring walking trails through woodlands, wetlands and along canals, Northwest Ohio really is a microcosm of the entire state.

It would make for a perfect "happily ever after" if Ohioans like me can protect the waters of Lake Erie and its environs for future generations to enjoy. There are simply some things that money can't buy--and shouldn't!

BIO: Cindy A. Matthews writes fiction under three pen names now--she can't seem to help herself! She writes traditional contemporary/fantasy romance tales as Cynthianna www.cynthianna.com as well as pens erotic/contemporary/paranormal/SF romance stories as Celine Chatillon. (www.celinechatillon.com). She also writes the Young Adult sci-fi romantic-adventure BloodDark series under her "real name" with her husband Adrian J. Matthews. (http://blooddarkbooks.blogspot.com ) In her spare time she volunteers with Toledoans for Safe Water and grows organic tomatoes. Quite a lot of them actually--she's never killed a tomato plant yet!

(All info provided and released by author)