God and Nature - Philosophical Points

This was an email sent to an old college buddy that has the patience to apparently read what I write...

I think we may have a tropical disturbance off our coast.  Every time it rains like this it reminds me of (and IF I have said this before its because I'm an old guy that starts repeating myself) of one of the Star Trek movies where they visit a dark world that seems to rain all the time.

Well I had me another run in with that cotton mouth moccasin this afternoon.  I suddenly remembered that I had a trimmer engine project outside and I'll be danged I looked out the window and the bare bones intake port was pointed right up at the sky.  (blazes! and phooey!) So I went out in the rain picked up the trimmer and put it in the shed and as I turned around that's when I saw that snake again alongside the house playing around the water coming out of the gutter.  I don't suppose he was playing so much as planning how he could swallow me but we scared each other anyway.

Once I got to the part of the book where the old man hooks the 18' marlin off the coast of Cuba in his 16' wood skiff I just couldn't put the book down until I finished it.  Out of maybe 100 pages 70 are devoted to his ordeal with hauling in this fish.  In Ernest Hemingway's Old Man and the Sea I have now read this book as an older fella and it was laugh out loud funny.  When I was in High School or whatever I don't remember it being so funny or so philosophically right-on about life's struggle for a big prize.  Pick it up again especially in September because the time is September when the story is portrayed.  You'll see you'll like it.

Let me re-visit the snake story.  I don't watch the weather.  Unless something fun is happening in the tropics I don't go to the online weather channel as a general rule.  I don't care I know the sun will rise the humidity with it and etc.  So seeing the big water snake yesterday actually portended the torrential rainfall we've had all day.  You see God has bestowed upon the humble beasts of the world this inate sense of what is going to happen next.  Especially when it has a potential to impact the furtherance of the species.  The character of Santiago in The Old Man and the Sea is an example of a man being able to read the signs of nature and learn from her.  In fact to him the sea is female.  At my house , if you are a water snake, the place to be is down a small hill to a canal ditch full of slow running water where there are frogs and small fish and wood rats.  I've seen the wood rats they are cute little brown furry animals with beady black eyes that steal bird seed from the neighbor and try to hide it in my air conditioner.  Oh yeah.

In one way the snake is welcome in another not.  We can work as a team against the rats or if I see him too much I will have to play the part of the Queen of Hearts and say "Off with your head!".

I'm sort of rambling expositorially tonight but there are tons and tons of people that scoff and laugh and make fun of people like me that believe that there was once a world-wide flood and a man and his family  built a survival vessel out of wood on a mountain and in the act of doing so obeyed God and started "Planet Earth- Take #2 snap!".  There is so much proof that the only way to not believe it is to ignore it.  This instinct of survival caused the choice animals of the world to come to higher ground to this survival vessel probably before and even during the rain and the water that was unlocked from fissures in the earth.  Animals behave differently and cooperatively during bad weather for the good of all.  It is a good lesson for people.  That is why I never call evil people animals.  I call them evil.  When the men flew planes into the Trade Center in New York they weren't animals in a derogatory sense they were evil.

To end on a light note.  I attended a concert at church tonight to show my support of the teens that are making music that doesn't go down to the least common denominator like Eminem but is positive.  Amy and I were sitting next to a mom and her retarded son who was about 14 judging by his size.  He reached across Amy to grab my shiny wristwatch and said "Ofn sne hummph!".  So I said "Oh you like my watch here!" and I took it off and gave it to him to play with.  He put it real up close to his eyes and held it in both hands like it was the only thing in the universe.  Music blaring, lights flashing onstage and I listened.  About 5 minutes later the mom hands my watch back to me and I put it on.  Later I go to Walmart and am shopping all the while thinking it is 8:21pm as I head to the checkout line.  I get home in 5 minutes and glance at the house clock and it said 9:38!  I got a good laugh from myself on the trick the boy played on me.