The Commerce of House Finches in the Setting Sun

I sought feeling the sun on my shaved head, my shoulders dappled with the sinking sun.  A trio of house finches hold a conference, one on the pitch of the roof, two in ornamental trees.  They puff out their pink breasts and exchange places, never standing on the same branch at the same time.  The content of their tet-a-tet-a-tet I couldn't discern.  They sounded angry at times, sternly making a point.  There wasn't a female in sight.  Maybe they were rivals

Active and demanding mockingbirds move in and out of the scene.  Twice the size of my little pink pinches, Mockingbirds are the undisputed king of the Mississippi sky.  From childhood, I was told they were named so because they mimicked any bird they heard, but their song sounded pretty distinct to me.  Their staccato song sounds like a New Orleans jazz trumpet warming up.  Three short blasts, then drop a note and three more.  I'm in their territory.

For a hundred thousand years, this spot entertained these same species of birds without anything like me nearby.  For the last forty-five years, their pristine habitat has been the manicured garden of a retirement village.  It makes no difference to the birds.  These are still their skies.  Millions of years before, they were therapod dinosaurs, and people like me were squirrels hiding in their shadows.  Part of God's plan was for us to exchange places.

Sweat bees, smaller than a field pea, ravage the dandelion and the clover of its booty.  I don't think they're capable of knowing their voracious scavenging actually is a vital part of the plant's life cycle.  I don't think they care.  I'm a giant intruder in their universe, but they don't care about that, either.  All they care about is the next blossom.   Bees never ponder their place in the universe.  Sometimes I envy them.

Suffering a digestive malady, I decided to attend church electronically today.  Galloway has broadcast their Sunday services since before I was born, first by radio, then television, and now the internet.  It was a true blessing during covid.  The pastor noted how much empty lumber there was at church this morning, gesturing to the empty pews.  He blamed it on the three-day weekend.  He might have been on to something.   One of the drawbacks of having so many remote options for attending church is that the pastor and the choir can't really gauge how many people they're reaching.  Today, it was at least two more than what he could see before him--probably many more.

I attended Sunday School by Zoom.  That's such a convenience.  Five of our members attended that way, including Ed King, who is somewhat famous in Mississippi terms.  My Sunday school is somewhat of a Millsaps Mafia.  There are graduates from the forties, fifties, sixties, seventies, and eighties in the class, and a solid number of professors and staff members as well.  We don't have any more recent graduates yet, but that could change at any moment.

Today we discussed free will and God's will.  To try and get a handle on the subject, we included the Theory of Special Relativity, Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle, Schrödinger's cat, Christopher Hitchins, and of course, the bible.  We like to warm up the class with a brief discussion of politics since we have some of the best political minds in Mississippi in the class.  Today we discussed the dilemma of the Mississippital Hospital Association and Medicaid expansion and the moral implications of what's happening there.  I'm secretly hoping that what I write might attract younger people to our August group.  We're not your ordinary Sunday School class, but I don't think there are any ordinary people reading anything I write.

I don't know God's will, even though I study it a great deal and have for quite a while.  I'm willing to admit I'm often agnostic because I'm trying to be really painfully honest when I write.  I don't know God's will.  I certainly don't understand God's will any more than I understand Special Relativity or Heisenberg's Uncertainty principle, but I understand they exist, and I understand what they address.  I understand that God's will exists, and I struggle to understand what it addresses.  With the sun on my bald head and the birds in my ears, sometimes I think I feel it.  I think we all do if we're quiet and listen.   God doesn't speak any clearer than my pink-bellied house finches, but I know they're communicating, and I know he's communicating.  I don't necessarily have to understand the message to understand it's important.