Denis Hayes, Earth Day Network

Denis Hayes is chair of Earth Day Network. He was the national coordinator for the first Earth Day in 1970 and now earns his keep as president of the Bullitt Foundation in Seattle, Wash. He is also author of the new book The Official Earth Day Guide to Planet Repair.

I roll out of bed at 5:30 a.m. Heavy early media schedule. Shave, shower, read Washington Post. And recoil. A front-page article is titled "Reno Decides to Remove Elian From Miami Kin." The article says the attorney general will move at the optimum moment based on variables ranging from Miami traffic to the weather forecast. I have a bleak premonition about when the "optimum moment" will come.

Within five minutes, CNN's Early Edition calls to cancel my interview. Soon, my once-intimidating early morning is entirely free. (Wish we'd thought ahead to invite Elian to attend Earth Day.)

At 9:00, I take a group of kids to see the solar exhibit on the Mall with Undersecretary of Energy Ernie Moniz, and then to see a wonderful traveling rainforest exhibit with Susan Seligman. Brent Blackwelder is inflating the massive Friends of the Earth "earth balloon," but says it's just a test. They plan to deflate it immediately because the weather bureau has issued tornado warnings for Washington.

Tornado warnings? I look closely to see whether Brent is pulling my leg. Nope. We have erected a dozen tents and a giant covered stage, and there might be a tornado? With stern Janet Reno, flood threats, and now tornadoes dominating my immediate future, I feel like I'm auditioning for a role in the Old Testament. No locusts or frogs yet.

James Urbati, the Earth Day Network marketing director, extricates me at 10:15 for a taped radio interview with WWDB. From 11:00 to 11:30, I do a program with public radio's Marty Moscoane, Professor Willett Kempton, and Peter Huber, a high-profile libertarian polemicist with the Manhattan Institute who claims to love the environment but is ideologically opposed to all efforts to protect it.

At noon, I switch to a live CNN Interactive web chat. The CNN hosts are skilled professionals with great senses of humor, and it goes smoothly. I'm always shocked to discover that, 24 hours a day, there seem to be people all around the world tossing questions and comments into zillions of these chat sessions.

A couple more networks cancel sessions due to the Elian frenzy, but NPR's Science Friday holds fast from 2:00 to 3:00. (Thank God no one bought Elian a chemistry set for Christmas.) Ira Flatow interviews Mark Hertsgaard and me about the environmental movement and global warming. It lasts an hour and displays the depth that we expect from NPR. I make a note to myself to increase my NPR contribution this year.

I join Kelly Evans, Gaylord Nelson, and a bunch of ED2K's celebrities as they head to the White House to watch President Clinton record his Earth Day presidential address. He's on message with global warming, and he announces some executive orders on federal energy use that don't require congressional approval. I look out the White House window and see a torrential downpour. It looks like Washington, D.C., has been transported to the bottom of Niagra Falls.

Then it's Planet Hollywood for a pre-Earth Day party with a lot of the folks who have been helpful. Ed Begley, Jr., and I lead the crowd in some chants. Chevy Chase and I cut a ceremonial Earth Day cake. Kelly Evans, our media-averse superstar executive director, consents to an interview with Oxygen Media, the new women's medium.