the best laid plans of mice and men.

Plans change.

It’s one of the few things that I know. That, and how peanut butter makes almost any situation better. Also, there’s the matter of the ocean and how to this day, scientists are discovering new creatures in its depths all the time. So I also know that we don’t know everything.

And all that makes me think of God.

For some reason, the way that the more we know actually reveals how much more we have to learn, makes me believe in him more. I like the weight that meaning gives to my every day and I cannot attribute meaning to life without God.

It’s like the difference between a robot building a structure and a man in love building a home. The robot constructs it with the correct measurements, sure, but there is no soul in the work. No emotion attached to the project, no kind of love that would cause a seven year project to feel only like seven days, he is so greatly anticipating the end result and what that means.

Because, meaning; it’s so weighty.

But the man in love–now, he builds a home. He draws it and dreams it. He falls asleep thinking of the way he can make the windows just so with a view of the ocean through the two in the front. He puts his heart into the project and the time he spends on it is nothing compared to the meaning he takes from it; a home for the one he loves.

And I think of God like that man in love. I’ve never loved robot stories so much, though I have heard very good things about Wall-E, but a love story? Now, that gets inside me. It goes deep and eventually yields the kind of garden that I can live off of for a very long time.

But what I meant to talk about was how plans change.

Like today, for instance. When we were all set to go swim in the 7,000 acres near my house. But then we hear a roll of thunder spread across the sky like dominoes are falling, but judging from the volume, these must be very big dominoes, indeed. And then the rain starts to fall and we already have our bathing suits on, so I tell the brave souls who will listen that it is time to go outside and march in the rain.

We are in our bathing suits anyway, I reason. But there is thunder! exclaims my mom. Shouldn’t you stay safe and inside? But thunder is just noise and I will not stay inside because of noise, though I did mollify her somewhat by promising to stay close to the house, at least.

So we ran outside. Eli, Emmy, Josh, and myself saw the trampoline and it seemed downright lovely to jump about in the storm.

And it was.

If it had been a movie, and had I been with people to who I was not directly related, it would have been a scene in which I fell in love. But I have learned that there is lots of magic left to the world, even when it does not include the business of falling in love, per se.

That isn’t to say that I didn’t exactly not fall in love. There was still the storm and the great leaps we were engaging in; I was definitely in love with all that business.

And my point is that we never did get to go to the 7,000 acres today. But what we did do was quite fetching anyway. And I don’t think I’ve ever written the word fetching before. Perhaps I should also tell Scarlett O’Hara that frankly, my dear, I don’t give a d**n. I mean, since I am saying antiquated things, and all.

But right, plans. They change. And since God is like a man building a home for the one he loves, I think he does something to help make sure it still turns out a masterpiece.

Life, I mean.