God Didn’t Have To

God didn’t have to create beauty

but He did

God didn’t have to create color

He could have made the world only in shades of orange

but He created too many colors for us to count

God didn’t have to create smiles

He could have dulled us to emotion

but He created that feeling you get inside

when you know you are loved and that you love

God didn’t have to create rhythm

He could have made sounds dissociated from each other

but He created melodies that resound in your head

and march with your heartbeat

God didn’t have to create memory

He could have unhooked us from time

and only exist in the present

so much heartache and regret would be wiped away

and with it would be childhood friends and the smell of fresh cut grass

but He created moments that last forever in hearts

God didn’t have to create communication

He could have made us live in our own secluded existence

and prevent fighting and harsh words

and prevent jokes and “I love you”

but He created over six thousand languages

and countless ways to say “happy”

God didn’t have to create anything

but He did

I think God is an optimist

and we should admire the extravagance of a sunset

and not the ending of a day

God created beauty because He wanted to

Niagara Falls on a recent vacation

 

Progress

We have told our story

in many different forms

throughout the ages

beginning in one and being transformed into another

grunts and groans of cavemen

pictures on cave walls

hand signals for hunting

places on maps

oral traditions from ages ago

playing musical bone flutes

hieroglyphics on the pyramids

Inca knots on ropes

carvings on trees

stone and chisel

writing with a stick in the dirt

writing on reeds

letters relaying currency and commerce across the sea

oil paintings

stain glass

feather pen and paper

ship logs

book translations

the Gutenberg printing press

Newspapers

Shakespearean plays

colonist journals

the piano

Enlightenment essays

the Declaration of Independence

Romantic era novels

steam boats and steam trains

Social reform and the Second Great Awakening

telegraph wires

the Pony Express

Photographs

typewriters

the Waltz

Muckrakers

telephones

the radio

Jazz

record player

motion picture

modern art

computers the size of a room

home television

the Beatniks

space travel and moon landings

telephone hot lines

personal computers

Disco

boomboxes

bag phones

Pac-Man

VCR tapes

Walkman cassette tapes

CD players

the internet

MP3 Players

cell phones

Facebook

texting

YouTube

Google Drive

iPads

Angry Birds

Snapchat

All of this progress and communication

where has it brought us

where have we brought it?

It is a part of ourselves now

It is a part of our culture now

We are what we create

and look at what we have created.

I am not saying it is right

I am saying that it is

What Makes My Heart Beat

The words made my heart beat

The single syllable pumped my very heart – more a soul than a heart

Every letter allowed me to breath

typed

handwritten

spoken aloud

gave oxygen to my lungs, that then flowed to my blood stream

Each sound and symbol that meant something was like blood to my veins

They were what kept me alive

making the day bright

and keeping me through the darkest night

I am not made up of elements

of carbon, and phosphorous, and 75% water

but of letters, and words and glorious ideas

Too often we take these words for granted

Too often we believe that we survive on

food

and water

and a place to lay our head

and not on the form of communication that has been taught to express

our every desire

and mis-desire

Too often

Too often

Too often

The words are what makes my heart beat.