Glorious Sunshine!

At the Quaker meeting I went to this morning one of the Friends spoke of the difficulty we have when something like the terrible earthquake in Haiti happens, in reconciling such cruel events in Nature with a belief in a kind and loving God. She brought a reading from a Quaker scientist which turned to this difficult topic and spoke of how two irreconcilable truths can become the stepping stone to new knowledge. As I contemplated the words, my thoughts turned to how, if we look in a mirror and see a flaw reflected there, we don't blame the mirror or the mirror's maker, rather we use what we see in the reflection to make a decision or take appropriate action. As I thought on the implications of this, I found the question surfacing: but if the created world - if nature - is merely reflecting the face of the observer, whose is that face: God's or humanity's? Rather than an answer, another question arose in my thoughts: what makes you think the two are different? Various bible verses and doctrine came to mind, such as Jesus saying "I am in the Father and the Father is in me", and that Christians are "One in Christ". As these thoughts were busy in my mind, another Friend stood and spoke about Love, the concept that God is Love, and brought the bible reading from Paul's letter to the Corinithians including the verse I had in mind when I named this blog: now we see in a glass darkly ...


After lunch I decided to make the most of the beautiful weather (mild and gloriously sunny with a clear blue sky) to go and begin the task of clearing up the allotment. Regular readers will remember I wrote last month that vandals have burnt down both of the sheds on my plot. It's dirty work but somebody's got to do it, right? It proved more tiring and dis-spiriting than I had ever imagined, disposing of the metal skeletons of gifts from my loving offspring, etc. I had toyed with the idea of hiring a skip but finally dismissed that idea in favour of using cardboard boxes and rubble sacks to cart the stuff down the dump. The past few weeks of inactivity have impacted my fitness level and I'd had enough after barely an hour's work. Then there was a 20 minute queue at the dump. By the time I got home I was nearly in tears with tiredness and despondency over the sad waste of it all - very unusual for me.

The one bright spot on the horizon is that another allotment-holder approached me. It seems she has also recently separated from her husband, and is thinking that the full plot will be more than she can reasonably manage single-handedly along with working full-time. She knew I was thinking of giving up the allotment and she suggested I'd miss it if I gave up totally - how about I take on a spare corner of her plot? At the moment it sounds like an offer too good to refuse (but I'll sleep on it a while to see if it still sounds good when I'm not feeling so down).