Back from Scotland: April/May 2019
06/01/2017-6:18 am
At Angela’s in Deer Park, (IL) sitting in the back garden by the pool, enjoying the sound of an approaching thunderstorm.
I’m reminded of our flight to Chicago from Knoxville the other evening. A really comfortable plane, a relatively smooth flight, very relaxing, much appreciated after the previous torture flight from Philadelphia to Knoxville.
As I sit with my coffee near the pool, I’m enjoying the words of a recent charity shop find, Love of Country by Madeline Bunting. The book is from our recent days in St. Andrews Scotland and chronicles Bunting’s many journeys to Scotland’s Western Hebridean Islands.
From my port side window, I observed the fading sun and the majestic clouds illuminated with its fading multicolored rays of light. One cloud had what appeared to be a covered patio on which we might have been able to park and just observe God’s marvelous creation. But it slowly passed, and then there was yet another intriguing shape to take its place.
Looking down, I noticed the swollen rivers. Glancing to the starboard side of our aircraft, I could see the massive thunderstorm we were skirting. It’s lightning illuminating occasionally the inside of our cabin. It seemed strange to see so much lightning and yet hear no thunder.
Having read in recent days of the major flooding on the rivers I observed below, and observing the power of the starboard thunderstorm, I realized this creation is still an alien and dangerous place for man, even with all his new technology and equipped as he is in his aluminum tube, traveling at several hundred miles an hour. He remains at the mercy of the storm.
Testing 1,2