What the cat fur happened?

Instead of paying attention to the road on my way to work, I waxed philosophical today. 

It was the deer’s fault.

When I dumped the trash this morning, I surprised a young doe.  In wide-eyed wonder she studied me as I eased from the car and gently tossed the garbage bag into the steel container.  Mesmerized by my voice that constantly assured her how pretty she was, the yearling stood silent as a statue.  Only an occasional flicking of her ears betrayed her presence.  Then, with a flick of her white tail, she whirled and floated through the woods on long, thin legs no bigger around than good-sized sticks.

While I stood there surrounded by trees and wild flowers, savoring the fresh woodsy scent and smiling at the crows calling out their greetings to the day, a question popped into my head:  Why are the ones that do no harm always the victims of the ones that do?

The deer symbolizes gentleness and beauty.  Bambi harms nothing except a few gardens here and there.  Yet somewhere in the woods you can bet a yahoo with a deer rifle is waiting to blow him away for sport.  This ignoramus is the same one that crosses the white line into the other lane to smash a turtle crossing the road.

Children.  Pure innocence.  How many suffer abuse and neglect at the hands of older and supposedly wiser adults?  The same with the elderly? 

If God created all and it behold it was very good, what the cat fur happened? 

Of course there are those that would say, “The Devil made it so.”  But if you go by the reasoning that God created all, then He made the devil and behold ol’ Scatch was very good.  Right?  If there was only good in the universe where did bad come from?

As I weaved in and out of traffic I wondered why God would put a Tree of Knowledge in the Garden of Eden only to forbid Adam and Eve to eat the fruit.  Isn’t that temptation?  Why would God have the need to tempt anyone?  Why did Cain kill Abel? Or was it the other way around?  I never could get that straight.  Did Abel have more toys than Cain?  Did he slew him for greed and power?  For money?

And what the cat fur is the deal with money?  Who invented it?  Did cavemen get tired of carrying around rocks so one day they up and decided to change to paper?  Who determined the value of this paper?  Who made up the rule, the more paper you have, the richer you are?  Why can’t we just trade?  You have something I need, and I have something you need.  Just trade.  No buying.  No selling.  We all know the old saying, “money is the root of all evil.”  But a friend of mine once said, “It isn’t money that is evil, it’s what you decide to do with it that is.” 

Okay, now we’re back to the good and bad thing.  Some would argue man has free will and that’s what messed everything up.  Here again, if God made everything it stands to reason he created free will.  Why give man a tool to use against good?

It just don’t make sense!

Needless to say, when I got into work, I was in a snit. It took until the afternoon to snap out of my funk.  I don’t have the answers to any of these questions, which I suppose is one reason why they bother me so.  But I’ll keep on wondering and asking.  Keep on trying to make sense of this crazy world we live in.  But until then, I agree with The Carpenters:

“Bless the beasts and the children, for in this world they make no war”