appeasing the horn

Have you ever ascribed feelings and emotions to inanimate objects? I do it all the time.

Yesterday we drove to Winkler for the Hildebrand Christmas festive making. The outdoor temperature was a balmy 1 degree and the highways were clear and dry. The sun was glaring in my vision and so I set the visor occasionally as our direction changed.

Long stretches of grid lined prairie pathways lay between here and there. I chose the path less travelled in order to break the land speed laws unnoticed. Flying along with the wind pressing hard from the South, we focussed on the straight path ahead. A certain trance overcomes me as there are no distractions, except for the one farmer putting along checking the crops...at least they were there in September.

The quietness calls out and says, "Break me if you can." The silence is broken by the car horn calling out. I discover that my hand has liberated the horn from it's boredom...it's lack of fulfilled purpose. "I have a responsibility you know," it calls out to my imagination. No one else in the car hears it. There is plenty of time before we arrive. I reach out and again I appease it's frustration. "Let me be heard...let me sing."

I look over at loved one and she already knows from days past that I hear voices. "The gods must be crazy." Crazy like Carol who eats all the green gummy bears first because they always get left out. Crazy like Carol who takes birthday cakes and thinks it will absorb into birthday boy's scalp. Crazy like the men of Athens who have an altar with the inscription: To An Unknown God.

We arrived just in time to be called to the table. Hello everyone...Merry Christmas. We prayed to a well-known God and gave thanks.

Later, when our bodies are screaming out to be nourished once more, and the food has been second set, Mom says, "Pray if you want to..." My brain smiles and says, "Smoke 'em if you got 'em." I imagine the face of our God not being appeased at my unwillingness to stop and give thanks.

I think that perhaps I really don't know Him all that well. Perhaps if I ascribe a greater portfolio of feelings and emotions to Him other than just disapproval and wrath, the whole Ram might be appeased...not just the horn.