Schooling children at home keeps one on the lookout for "teachable moments."
 
So when we arrived at church one morning to find a big tree branch had spiked the nursery's ceiling, I rubbed my hands in anticipation of Squinx's questions.
 
We would get to talk about gravity, aging, structures, and the statistical likelihood of getting hit by a falling limb ... and what would happen to the soul of a Christian who got in the way of one. Physics and metaphysics all in one! A perfect teachable moment.
 
Her first question: "Did it make a loud noise?"
 
Stopped me cold.
 
Of course it made a loud noise, sweetie. Anything that big striking something that hard will make a loud noise.
 
However, since no one was around to hear it, according to science, there was no sound.
 
now you see why i reject scientific explanations and definitions that get in the way of understanding. According to science, the fact of sound waves' existence is negated by no one's hearing them. If a deaf shark farts in the Indian Ocean, it can be detected by seismic listening posts in Guam. But 100 years ago, before we had such instruments, the same emission would, technically, make no sound.
 
How, exactly, does that make sense?
 
Only to a scientist.
 
I have other beefs with them. I did well in my science courses, but I refused to accept that a person ascending stairs is "doing work" under the definition of work, but the same person descending them is not. Supposedly, in the latter case, the stairs "do work" on him.
 
That kind of noodle-noggining exasperates me. I want to chase a dozen science-textbook authors down the Sears Tower's fire escapes, then see which one at the bottom still thinks he hasn't done any work.

Counting our blessings, no one was hurt by the plunging lumber. The tree itself had looked dead all spring, probably from root failure after all the new construction nearby. I'd noticed it failing this year from my post as morning-mass server; its position outside a window right next to another tree of the same type highlighted its absence of foliage. I'm usually skeptical of tree-trimmers' opinions of the health of trees they're called upon to examine. They don't make money not cutting them down, after all. But this one was obvious, and I do regret not speaking up. A healthy church is tended by all its parishioners, not just by the vestry.

i believe i have enough to keep me busy today. The SUV didn't pass inspection last week; the picture-windows still need some finishing out; Roomba's invisible barrier projector mysteriously burst in two, and warrants a bit of solder and epoxy; Wolf Dog is running a two-walk deficit; and, oh yes, the family needs its father for the weekend.

Next post under Fixing Stuff, by day's end.

Posted by: Michael Rittenhouse at 06:06 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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