Musings on Earth and Space

The yard is growing greener and more over-grown as the shifting tide of seasons comes with the March days. The trees and plants would run wild if they were not tamed by trimming. The persistence of nature is astounding, even in the smallest of ways. The trees are so visible with fresh blooms and branches, and on windy days, they produce the sounds we acknowledge as wind, for we otherwise cannot see the wind. Is it breath? Is it spirit? Alas, it is both. The trees grow and surpass all obstacles to continue onward and upwards, and yet, they are not thinking, walking, talking beings, unless they are Ents of course (but we can talk about Tolkien's world later). We do not have too many Ents around here, as the imagination does not place them in tropical places. Our woods are not as old or mysterious.

But I can still imagine.

The Orchid tree is in full bloom outside my window. Pink blossoms are wide open, attracting the bees. The sun blazes onto them most days and the rest of the greenery that fills the yard. I like my view from up in the tree house.

The sunlight sparkles into my kitchen. A warmer day has come. On days like today, I wish the sun were not so vibrant. It brings heat through the windows with intensity. What if we could turn down the volume of the sun? I suppose that would not be welcome for the northern places who would like to bask in the sunlight on cold days, but here we have it in plenty.

Which makes me think wider and bigger. Our place in the solar system is so perfect, nobody but God could have arranged everything "just so" so that we could live. I wonder, did God create the universe and planets, and see the earth as a perfect spot for creating humans who were so dependent on the elements designed to sustain them? Could there be other planets somewhere with creations living, but unfallen? What if there is a green lady on a planet out there in another galaxy? Perelandra raises such questions and brings us face to face with that possibility within our own solar system, and it is forever a favourite tale of C.S. Lewis's.

God gives us a vast universe to figure out. Bit by bit we make discoveries on our planet and beyond it. One unassuming day, something new will be found to befuddle us all. That happens fairly often, actually, as with the dimming of the star, Betelgeuse. I am fascinated by it. It is a mystery of God that we have just cracked open to peak inside.

All this micro and macro thinking brings me out of myself, away from my tiny struggles, to see the massively big picture, alongside the intricacy of the tiny. I am part of the tiny, and I still get to talk to God, who sees the whole universe all at once, outside of time. Our Creator, who made all the galaxies and stars we have studied and haven't even discovered yet, wants to draw me closer (what a wonder!). And I sometimes resist like a typical human who gets so distracted with the self. But in mysterious moments such as these, I am drawn in close.