Words of Truth and Right-Thinking.

******

After church today I decided to pick up litter on Jonesville Road. 

Took me three hours to do it. 

Three bags full of 

beer cans

whisky bottles

soda pop cans

more beer cans

cigarette butts

napkins

pieces of torn tarps

more beer cans

and when I came home, Mister Jones met me at the door. 

I showed him the pocketful of shotgun shell brass

retrieved while picking up litter. 

While out on the roadside

several people waved and shouted words of encouragement, 

most just drove on by and didn't acknowledge me, 

one kid hollered "Awesome!" 

and one guy chucked a just-emptied beer can in my direction. 

I wanted to get ugly and shout words I am not supposed to say because 

I am a child of God

but something my dear Pastor friend said to me after church

rose to the surface of my heart

and I pondered it a good long while, 

there on the side of the road. 

First I have to tell you, 

I'm kinda in a quandary about this whole Coronavirus thing, 

not that I am fearful or anything like that, 

but I cannot subscribe to the idea that it could be 
something God made happen to bring the world to justice et al, 

because I'm a science-y sort of girl. 

Bacteria and viruses have been in the world for a long dang time

and I know viruses go dormant and are shed by their hosts

and they replicate

and all that virus-y sort of stuff. 

In my world, in my mind, viruses just are. 

 I don't know. Maybe God did make viruses. 
I don't know. 
Maybe I'll ask him some day. 
Ask him about the pandemic
and ask him about slugs, 
you know, why, God?? why slugs, God?

But it all goes back to what my Pastor said to me today. 

God is up to something good. 

God is working this out to the good. 

People are still looking for hope. 

People are watching us. 

No man is in control. 

The only one in control is God. 

I had to think about that awhile. 

She pointed across the street from the church

where we were standing out in the parking lot chatting, 

a family playing together in their yard. 

She said see? that's what God intends to happen. 

And then I got it. 

It all goes back even further to a long-ago conversation Pastor Roz and I had about

God doesn't intend for evil to be. 

God wants there to be Good in the world. 

So, when that beer can clattered on the hardpan and rolled towards my feet

and I wanted to say

you know

but did not say

you know....

I thought about how I can rise above and think good. 

I can think good and not evil. 

And now, as I still hunker down 

and walk Coyote Hill every day

and nurse my Wee Man Doggie 

twenty-four-hours-a-day-seven-days-a-week

and sit these days in joyful union with my little family

and enjoy this beautiful Spring weather bestowed upon us, 

I trust everything will work out. 

There will be good. 

Even for Ziggy in this final chapter of his life. 

All that will be OK, too. 

Everything is as it is meant to be. 

I trust. 

******