My spiritual experience at the octopus tank.

First, I'll tell you that I looooove underwater because it is so amazingly graceful and mysterious and weird and scary and alien. Now I'll just relay the story. Sarah and I went there for a vacation, and went through the aquarium in about 2 hours. I wanted to stop and gawk a bunch more, but didn't want to try Sarah's patience (she likes it lots too, and I don't want to be a bother.) Anyway, then she went to the bookstore next door and I went back through the aquarium. This time, when I got to the octopus tank--which is about 5'x8' wide or a little bigger--I got the chance to just stop and watch for about 20 minutes. In the tank, they just have one giant octopus, that's it. And everyone else just was just sort of giving it a cursory glance and then moving on because it wasn't really doing anything, which was fine by me because I got to stand as close as I wanted. And then it slowly moved from one corner of the tank all the way to the other. It was incredible. I guess the reason why it's "spiritual" for me is because when I see nature, and particularly sea life or cats or small animals, I always think about how awesome God's creativity is. He spends so much time on the details, you know? And I recognize that for some people, maybe many, when they see sea life they think of evolution and science and the randomness of things. And I'm not going to say how God creates things because He's God and does whatever He likes, but when I saw that octopus, I could feel the amazing intentionality of its being. I could see its delicacy and its power and its finesse. It was enough to make my eyes well up. In my head sometimes I imagine God saying something like, "I know most people will not value you or give you more than a passing glance. Some will only think of what they can get from you or how you can benefit them. Some will abuse you for their own amusement, or carelessly destroy your home or food for their own profit. In fact, most won't even see you because of where you'll live. But despite all this, I am going to put my full creative power to bear in your being. You won't be the highest form of life on the planet, but you will be as you should be, down to the very last detail. You will be as perfect an octopus as you can be on this present earth. And through your beauty, I will demonstrate my own beauty. Even if no one were to ever recognize it, you are my precious creation, and you are worth the time and effort. I enjoy you."