I�m transcribing interview tapes for Habitat for Humanity for extra money. It�s carpal tunnel inducing, and this tape is of a murmuring German with a loud laugh that drowns out the interviewer�s questions�. But I�m still kind of enjoying it.

Just hearing about different experiences. This guy�s directing house building in Outer Mongolia. And he just said that he couldn�t do it without god. That there�s no way to live this kind of life � away from friends and family, faced with horrors every day - without belief in God. And I just thought, �I don�t believe in God... and I�m doing it�

And I don�t know why... but I suddenly remembered eating lunch on a path in a green grassy park outside the children�s hospital where I worked in Ottawa. And seeing all the kids being wheeled up and down in their wheelchairs in the bright sunshine. And then I thought of this gorgeous tree I saw last month when I was in a toy train chugging up a barren, drought-affected mountain. This huge tree with massive yellow flowers hanging like lanterns, in the middle of miles of dust.

Those two pictures just popped into my head, one after another, when I heard that man say �there�s no way you can do it without god�

I don�t know about god.. .but I think that there�s no way I could do it without lantern trees and kids in sunshine.

2:37 a.m. - 2004-05-25