sheep...

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It's been a crazy day. Crazy woman = crazy day, everyday. I'm pooped from fighting Ci Ci to take a nap and from the general crazy-ness that is my life... not that I don't enjoy every second of it! And I guess I should be thankful that my life is crazy in a normal way now, instead of crazy in the way it used to be.... that's confusing, even to me...

Anyway, this morning I started thinking about sheep. You know, baaaa.... sheep. Except really I was thinking about people who are "sheepish" or "sheeply" or whatever you want to call them. I was wondering why and how people follow so easily, so blindly, without question. And I though, well, come on Ali, Jesus said he was our shepherd and that we were his sheep (right?). So, I thought there surely must be something to be said for sheep. Maybe they're really bright animals and I just don't know it. I mean, I'm not a farmer.... we've got some chickens... but I'm not a farmer. Maybe, I kept thinking, sheep are smarter than they get credit for.

So I did some research. And sheep are STUPID. Apparently in 2006 over 600 sheep died after one sheep in the flock lead the other 599 sheep off a cliff. That's right, every one of them followed that stupid sheep right off the edge of a cliff. I just can't fathom. I mean maybe if you were sheep #2 you might follow right over. But what if you were sheep #570, or #599, or #600? Wouldn't you kind of stop and say to yourself "hummm, those guys just fell and didn't come back. Maybe I should just hang here for awhile".

And I couldn't figure out why Jesus kept saying he was our shepherd. Maybe it's because we're pretty stupid. I know we all like to pretend that we're all soooo smart and that we've got it all figured out. But come on people! We know that there are some pretty dumb fools out there (I will occasionally include myself in the dumb fool group). So I kept reading. And apparently some sheep are a little smarter than old #1 who lead all his family and friends into oblivion. And usually these are the leader sheep. But occasionally some moron sheep steps in and goofs it all up for the rest. Enter shepherd. The responsibility of the shepherd is to protect the sheep. Sometimes, to protect them from themselves. According to wikipedia "The shepherd supervises the migration of the flock". I thought that was interesting. The migration....

It is interesting to me that we are sheep after all. I guess sometimes we think we're the shepherd. But we're sheep. Some may be a little smarter than others, some may have a little more sense than to lead the others off the cliff. And some may not have that much sense after all. I'm sure if you asked #1 sheep, right before he stepped over the edge, he would have said that he was a genius. I wonder how may of the others thought he was as smart? They all followed right behind, didn't they?

I wonder if I would have followed #1 off that ledge? I hope The Shepherd is there to stop me if I ever try.


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