last night a Century plant blossomed

Yesterday I sat for 3 hours with a sparse amount of other mothers and a few dads at the REd Rock track meet. I still feel a wonderful sense of pride to watch Rita run and hurdle and jump and do her track thing. The two mom's I sat next to were very Christian and one is a dear friend for years. We have never had anything but great talks about our kids and religion has never come up. The other mother with a quick tongue from the start seemed very affable and we agreed about breastfeeding over other things such as the woman in bleechers below us giving her sick infant a pepsi bottle to drink and then play with the cap in his little 2 yr old mouth. I was shocked that anyone would give a baby a small chokable item. this mom spent most her time on the cell phone and pacifying the toddler with cheesewhiz chips and pepsi so this mom and I could agree that was probably not good for this little boy and he was terribly sick, coughing and crying the entire time. The subject of movies was brought up by one of her pre teen daughters and she started to talk about how bad the language was and I agreed movies are not what they used to be. I asked if she had seen the series"Planet Earth" as I liked to reccommend that to anyone who wants to see something the entire family could watch. Her first question was,"Do they mention millions and millions of years?" and I looked at her like"what?" and then she said,"ya know, what was the"slant".. then I said,"slant?" and she said "yeah there is always a slant". I said,"Its about the earth, different ecosystems and nature, animals,". She looked at me with a weird smirk. I got a pit in my stomach as I realized that this woman with her deep felt Christian beliefs was actually going to censor her kids from seeing Planet Earth. This was crushing to me as I never figured that religion of any kind would judge what moviemakers document as endangered species and a planet so beautiful and fragile and our home as being something that her kids couldn't watch because someone might say the earth is a certain age. This really put my mind in a spin for the rest of the track meet. I just couldn't believe that this woman who we shared so much in common could be so dogmatic about science and earth and the animals. I didn't say another word to her just sat there watching the kids on the field.
AFterwards I waited at the car and spent time cleaning it out while Rita helped the other kids take a victory lap around the track. That warmed my heart to see all of them, healthy, running after working themselves to death running for hours before. I really admire these kids, the athletes, they don't have to do what they do but they know its fun and keeps them healthy.
I also admire the parents who come and sit for hours on end supporting their kids and mine, the coaches, the volunteers. All of them make this important for the kids and those same children will grow and inherit the earth as we once did. An earth that supports us but needs care and love and nurturing like the children. We must keep our eyes and hearts open, regardless of our religious beliefs.
Just before I was going to leave w Rita I spied a century plant, struggling to grow between the sidewalk of the school parking lot and I snapped a photo of it, which I am sharing here. By summer's beginning this plant will have a spike about 5 ft taller than its already 6ft tall flower and little white flowerettes attached. There is an entire world within that flower. When I zoomed into the center of it I saw bugs and flies and realized that was an entire world, one we must also care for. CAre for our world, its the only one we have! Earth day is upon us... go get that series and watch it..Planet EArth!