Playing Cards
Several of years ago, Patricia decided that we should go on an Alaskan cruise to celebrate our anniversary. So we booked passage, flew to Vancouver, British Columbia, and set sail for Alaska.
The trip was delightful. We saw a whale on the sea, eagles in a tree, and salmon spawning up a river. We heard the history of the Ketchikan, Juneau, Skagway, and Sitka. We lounged, loafed, and laid around. Beyond a doubt, the climax of the trip was on the last day at sea. Our ship sailed up the College Fjord (a fjord is a narrow river) to the face of the Harvard Glacier.
I’ve had the privilege of traveling virtually all over the world. I have been to London, Paris, Rome, Damascus, Jerusalem, Cairo, Mexico City, Ecuador, Bogotá as well as Beijing, Hawaii, and Sydney. I’ve walked on a glacier in Alaska, stood in awe before Niagara Falls, and traveled through a rain forest in the Amazon jungle, but nothing I have ever seen quite compares to standing on a ship looking at the face of a mammoth glacier.
Our ship pulled within three to five hundred yards of the face of the Harvard Glacier, which is a mile and a half wide, three hundred feet high and six and a half miles deep. It is bright white and Windex blue. Portions are black from the rock the glacier crushed as it moved. It makes sounds like thunder. Sheets of ice crashed into the water. We stood speechless before the magnificent block of ice.
We were so close to the glacier that I could not get it all in one picture, even with a wide-angle lens. So, I decided to go to the back of the ship and get a picture with my wide angle lens as we pulled away from the glacier. The cruise ship was nine hundred and sixty-three feet long, which is more than three football fields. As fast as I could move, without breaking into a run, I made the trip from bow to aft. The journey took me down several flights of stairs and through a couple of dining halls.
As I passed through the otherwise deserted dining halls, I was stunned to see one lone couple—playing cards! Imagine being in the presence of one of the most spectacular sights on the earth and playing cards!
They may have seen it before, maybe even several times. In my opinion, even if that were the case, I personally would have had a hard time not taking another look. Their card playing was not a commentary on the glacier; it was a commentary on them.
Upon reflection, I decided that people do this all the time. On Sunday morning, they stand in the presence of the Word of God and the God of the Word and mentally play cards. How many have sailed through life missing the majesty because they are preoccupied playing games?
By the way, I got the picture. Did you?
© G. Michael Cocoris 9/12/2004
The trip was delightful. We saw a whale on the sea, eagles in a tree, and salmon spawning up a river. We heard the history of the Ketchikan, Juneau, Skagway, and Sitka. We lounged, loafed, and laid around. Beyond a doubt, the climax of the trip was on the last day at sea. Our ship sailed up the College Fjord (a fjord is a narrow river) to the face of the Harvard Glacier.
I’ve had the privilege of traveling virtually all over the world. I have been to London, Paris, Rome, Damascus, Jerusalem, Cairo, Mexico City, Ecuador, Bogotá as well as Beijing, Hawaii, and Sydney. I’ve walked on a glacier in Alaska, stood in awe before Niagara Falls, and traveled through a rain forest in the Amazon jungle, but nothing I have ever seen quite compares to standing on a ship looking at the face of a mammoth glacier.
Our ship pulled within three to five hundred yards of the face of the Harvard Glacier, which is a mile and a half wide, three hundred feet high and six and a half miles deep. It is bright white and Windex blue. Portions are black from the rock the glacier crushed as it moved. It makes sounds like thunder. Sheets of ice crashed into the water. We stood speechless before the magnificent block of ice.
We were so close to the glacier that I could not get it all in one picture, even with a wide-angle lens. So, I decided to go to the back of the ship and get a picture with my wide angle lens as we pulled away from the glacier. The cruise ship was nine hundred and sixty-three feet long, which is more than three football fields. As fast as I could move, without breaking into a run, I made the trip from bow to aft. The journey took me down several flights of stairs and through a couple of dining halls.
As I passed through the otherwise deserted dining halls, I was stunned to see one lone couple—playing cards! Imagine being in the presence of one of the most spectacular sights on the earth and playing cards!
They may have seen it before, maybe even several times. In my opinion, even if that were the case, I personally would have had a hard time not taking another look. Their card playing was not a commentary on the glacier; it was a commentary on them.
Upon reflection, I decided that people do this all the time. On Sunday morning, they stand in the presence of the Word of God and the God of the Word and mentally play cards. How many have sailed through life missing the majesty because they are preoccupied playing games?
By the way, I got the picture. Did you?
© G. Michael Cocoris 9/12/2004