Food for Thought
I don’t often need to park the car in the centre of Dornoch because I usually walk to wherever I’m going if it is in the town, but on Saturday past I was on my way back from somewhere when I decided (as one does) that I needed some mushrooms so I parked the car on the main street, opposite happy afternoon tea drinkers in Luigi’s.
I nipped out and got the mushrooms and then I decided that the pup could do with a new collar so I aimed for the pet shop and there I splashed out on a rather striking bright red one!
I then went back to the car. I clicked my key to unlock the doors, but they wouldn’t open for me. I clicked again... and again and I was about to click yet again when I was conscious of being watched.
I looked to my right and there a pair of very familiar eyes met mine.
The pup was looking out at me from the boot of my car, parked in front of the car whose doors I was frantically trying to open. I am sure he was shaking his head in disbelief.
Thankfully at this point my back was to the window of Luigi’s where all those afternoon tea and coffee drinkers were presumably sitting watching. I sidled forward to my own car and got in as quickly as I could!
One story.
Let me offer you another. This time an early morning walk with the fog hanging eerily over the Dornoch Firth.
The sun was just rising and there were streaks, through the fog, of very bright pink stretching across the whole of the sky. The largest flock of geese I have ever seen, squawked and gaggled its way to a very noisy landing on the beach and once landed the geese continued to talk to one another.
Geese don’t strike me as being subtle birds. They seem to like to make their presence known!
But then all of a sudden, there was dead silence – just for three or four seconds. The silence, the sky, the fog – it was heart stopping! One of those fleeting moments when you feel as though you have witnessed something truly wonderful.
The foolish (me) and the beautiful (the beach).
To me, these are the sorts of things that point to an amazing creator whose imagination is able to dream up all sorts of possibilities.
They point to a God with a sense of humour who can move us, inspire us, overwhelm us, cry with us and laugh with us too.
In the words of one of the songs the children sing at school assemblies:
Who put the colours in the rainbow? Who put the salt into the sea?
Who put cold into the snowflake? Who made you and me?
Who put the hump upon the camel? Who put the neck on the giraffe?
Who put the tail upon the monkey? Who made hyenas laugh?
Who made whales and snails and quails?
Who made dogs and hogs and frogs?
Who made rats and bats and cats?
Who made ev’rything?
The song goes on to say it surely can’t be chance that brought all these things into being – and from my experience of our wonderful world, I am inclined to agree. How about you? –
Susan Brown
