God all around us

Know right now, I am NOT an ornithologist.  Not even a bird watcher.  Not really.  But I do notice them.  Remember that old song, “May the Bluebird of Happiness Fly Up Your Nose,”……..no, better not go there.  Nonetheless, while the wife and I were down at the lake, we were wandering toward the shore from the cabin, and happened across a bluebird that appeared to me to be rather young, which may account for what we noticed.  Didn’t look like the bluebirds I have seen before…..but it never turned to face us, so I didn’t get a front view.  It was puttering around on the ground about 5 yards from us…..not sure what it was looking for, but it was just kind of wandering around there.  My wife commented, and I agreed, that it was about the brightest blue she had ever seen in a bluebird.  It really was.  Almost iridescent…..and the bluebird probably doesn’t even know what that word means!  Kind of a cool serendipity sort of moment.  We stood and watched it until it finally flew away.  Really striking.

One of my favorite quotes was written by Elizabeth Barrett Browning.  It goes like this:

                     “Earth's crammed with heaven,
                     But only he who sees takes off his shoes;
                    The rest sit round and pluck blackberries.”

That bird was a good example.  All around us, every day, there are sights, sounds and moments of wonder and beauty, if we will stop to look and take off our shoes, instead of gorging ourselves with the blackberries.  That was a pretty cool moment for me, probably for us, but definitely for me.  I also got a kick out of the little fish that would come and eat what we had stirred up on the rocks by the shore with our feet…..even getting within an inch of my toes to get to whatever it was as they flitted around in the water.  Fish are fast, you know that?  Well, hope you have some moments today. I plan on doing so.

TL:DR  A chance encounter with a beautiful bluebird reminds us that there are special touches of God all around us if we look to see them.