Monotony or repeated delight?

The hardship that sidelined us for much of last week continues, so I’m still posting slower than I’d like. And this in a week when I’ve had so many visitors! Thanks for stopping by; I hope to pick up the pace towards normal by Monday.

As I was completing some “drudgerish” tasks today, I was grumbling a bit inside about the things that need doing day after day after day. And I remembered this quote from G. K. Chesterton, that has brought me much joy:

“The thing I mean can be seen, for instance, in children, when they find some game or joke that they specially enjoy. A child kicks his legs rhythmically through excess, not absence of life. Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, “Do it again,” and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun, and every evening, “Do it again” to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we. The repetition in Nature may not be a mere recurrence; it may be a theatrical encore.”

 

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