As I looked out my frost-spattered window this past morning the lifting fog whisps shadowed the sparsely-spaced, fluffy, white snowflakes floating slowly downward.
It was obvious the wind had dropped. The flag hung limp against the pole, not giving the slightest indication of wind speed or direction. It seemed to show total dejection at not seeing the sun on the horizon.
The number of wild birds that flitted back and forth from the feeder indicated to me that a storm must be brewing, but from my second floor window, I had no way of seeing the cloud formations, inspired by the lakes, forming in the west.
Doing nothing has never found sanction in my vocabulary, so I slowly rose up off of my butt to go out and have a peek. I had not yet negotiated the three steps off of our southeast-facing side porch when I saw something that appeared, at first sight, rather unusual.
On the snow-covered hillside, I could see a number of jackrabbit-sized creatures moving slowly, in relative unity, across the back hillside. It took me several moments before I suddenly deciphered exactly what they were and what they were doing. Perhaps I should go back inside and once again clean my glasses.
Apparently our white-bodied, brown-headed herd of fall-fattened, winter-coated Boer goats had decided to take advantage of the warm temperature and had wandered out to nip the seed heads off of the weeds on the knee-deep, snow-covered hillside. What I was seeing was the movement of their heads only, as the white of their bodies blended well with the snow-covered, frost-glistening grasses.
I have worn glasses since the age of seven, so my eyes have become somewhat domesticated; I see not now as I once did. When a kid, I could see a small bird on a twig a field away and identify it by its own unique movement, but now I wait till they fly to ID them by their pattern of flight. Colour, too, is not now so vivid but the pattern will give it a name. The diverse oddities of each species have always been a reason of wonderment for me.
My line of thought lingers along the line that it could not be denied by anyone that nature is the artwork of God, leaving me questioning Christian theology that all was created in six days, while rest was taken on the seventh.
Where lurks the indication that creation did not continue on the eighth day? Where hides the possible fact that evolution and creation are not one and the same? Are new discoveries not surfacing each and every day? Are any of these so-called inventions of man not part and parcel of the Master’s plan? Is not the evolution of life, though not readily considered, still in progress? Mother Nature and God, I’m quite sure, skip along hand in hand.
I think, also, that you’d be hard pressed to find a reason that would change my mind.
Take care, ‘cause we care.
barrie@barriehopkins.ca
519-986-4105