The best laid plans

Hands up if you've heard of Robert Burns.

Of course you have!

He's the famous Scottish poet of a couple of hundred years ago.

Now, hands up if you're familiar with the proverb begun in the post title.

The best laid plans of mice and men often go astray.

We've all been victim of the concept, right?

Did you know that the saying is from Burns' poem, To a Mouse?

He wrote it after ploughing up a fieldmouse's nest one day. The poem becomes a reflection on his enormous power over her life. She had spent all her days preparing the nest so that she could be comfortable. In one moment her life was undone, which fact caused Burns to reflect upon the despondency that he felt in his own life  at the grand age of twenty six. 

Most of the poem is completely unintelligible, written in a broad Scottish dialect that sounds like an alien tongue. One verse, however, is particularly poignant and fairly comprehensible, even to a poetry heathen such as I.

I'm truly sorry Man's dominion
Has broken Nature's social union,
An' justifies that ill opinion,
Which makes thee startle,
At me, thy poor, earth-born companion,
An' fellow-mortal!

I sometimes wonder which giant in the sky is disturbing my nest!

Where was I?

Oh yes.

So, the actual line from which the proverb is taken goes thusly: 

The best laid schemes o' Mice an' Men

Gang aft agley.

And we all know what that means, don't we?

If you want to read the whole poem, accompanied by a lovely translation and interpretation, go here.

And what happened to Robert?

The poor lad died at the age of 37, presumably as the result of a dissolute life (he was a rascal) and a dental extraction.

And what has this got to do with anything?

I was about to tell you how my plans might be going astray.

Haiti is in more trouble each day.

Jeff has been casting foreboding glances my way, from under furrowed brow, as he reads each new dire headline.

First it was cholera, which I thought I could beat by being sanitary.

Now there are riots in the streets.

The volunteer staff of the birth clinic is fleeing the country even as I write this. They made it to a UN compound, disguised as cholera patients in the back of an ambulance, and will head to the Dominican Republic as soon as the riots cease.

I am distraught at the thought of giving up my dream, but even more at the thought of the desperation in which the Haitian people live. 

I still want to serve them, in the hopes that I can help create a small ray of hope for a few people. 

So, for now, I will act as if.

As if we are still leaving for Haiti on January 29th, 2011.

I will be cautiously optimistic, until I have reason to be otherwise.

And tomorrow, I shall go to the church and spend the morning with like-minded friends, making necessaries for  new mothers. 

So think happy thoughts for Haiti.

A few prayers winging their way to the giant in the sky wouldn't hurt either.