I'm from eastern Colorado, and I used to have tornado dreams several times a week during the season. I did see funnel clouds, and I saw a rope tornado that touched down. I could see the dust and debris coming up from the bottom. I think I almost lost continence from a kind of wild primal fear.
Anyway, I have always been amused by the juxtaposition of Tornado Alley and the Bible Belt. Maybe the threat of being wiped off the face of the earth, as happened (sadly) in Greensburg, Kansas, makes people more interested in believing HARD in God.
It is coming around the time of year for my annual "crisis of non-faith" where I feel really shitty that I can't believe in God or a Universal Life Spirit or anything like that. I have known many people who got immense comfort from such a belief, and while I generally go about my days as a law-abiding and (I think) ethical and moral atheist, about once a year I am sad that I cannot participate in the great and moving cultural interaction of Faith. Because even though I don't think there is a God, I do know (KNOW) that faith is an operational thing between people, something that, from time to time, helps individuals and groups be more than what they could be without it. The crisis of non-faith usually resolves when I start thinking of all the bad things done in the name (names) of God (gods).
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right there with you, although my crisis is usually just a passing thought while drinking the last of a bottle of wine.
I never had tornado dreams growing up in Kansas. I did have earthquake dreams when I lived in San Francisco, though.
I never have crises of non-faith. I do have delusions of "City for the Blind"s ... have I told you about that? It's when I think that everyone is good and that we can all come together and help one another - like build a City for the Blind. My faith in the goodness of humankind is resolved when I remember what jack-asses most people are. :)
Not a real big god girl, but not an aetheist either.
The stuff people do in the name of "insert diety name here" is just an excuse for our little beastie instincts...
we doseem to enjoy wholesale killing as a species.
so, if there is a god, maybe we are his prize fighting chickens.
(I wrote cocks and then changed it. does that make me an agnostic prude?)
It's not easy being athiest. Even when I was a kid I realized that it's a lot easier to believe (or more comforting anyway). I did join a Unitarian church a few years ago - a fairly misunderstood group we are. I think of us as the Church of Community. But even with that, I take the summer off every year (a Unitarian tradition).
Is the Bible Belt there because of Tornado Alley, or is Tornado Alley there because of the Bible Belt. Maybe God has a plan different than they image for Fundamentalist.
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