an interesting planet

There was a young couple strolling along half a block ahead of me. The sun had come up brilliantly after a heavy rain, and the trees were glistening and very wet. On some impulse, plain exuberance, I suppose, the fellow jumped up and caught hold of a branch, and a storm of luminous water came pouring down on the two of them, and they laughed and took off running, the girl sweeping water off her hair and her dress as if she were a little bit disgusted, but she wasn't. It was a beautiful thing to see, like something from a myth. I don't know why I thought of that now, except perhaps because it is easy to believe in such moments that water was made primarily for blessing, and only secondarily for growing vegetables or doing the wash. I wish I had paid more attention to it. My list of regrets may seem unusual, but who can know that they are, really. This is an interesting planet. It deserves all the attention you can give it.
(again, from Gilead by Marilynne Robinson)

Today, I helped proofread our university site, helped get some summer teachers set up to teach English at the Korean school, went to the office for an hour to help coordinate some stuff, took a longish walk behind our school (and got a little color on my skin in the process - finally!), took a short nap, and studied Chinese. More study to come after dinner.

It was a bright, (relatively) hot, sunny day, so the walk somehow wasn't as thoughtful or reflective as it seems to be when it's cool or when there's rain on the way. But still, each time I get a chance to take this walk behind our school, I am reminded that this is an interesting planet. Cows grazing, calves lounging in the grass while they watch me pass with large eyes, chickens pecking as they direct their little ones along, corn and eggplant in neat rows. As the work of the same one who made us, it does deserve all the attention we can give it.