Wake Up Call

Yesterday morning The Rev. woke me up to a grisly scene in our backyard. It seems our youngest animal's determination to become a killer was rewarded when she launched herself into a bouganvillea bush and caught a house finch. The poor bird never knew what hit it, and became the unfortunate fetch toy for all three of our cats. Our kitten was so proud of herself, strutting through our postage stamp size yard, bird dangling from her tiny mouth. She finally presented her mangled gift to us, a love offering by the sliding glass door of our patio.

I don't mind rats, mice, gophers, and moles being left for us. I've even been the recipient of a few badly crunched crawfish, but the bird really bothered me. The Rev. pointed out that we would have to be more careful in the future, to which I responded, "Isn't she just being a cat and doing what is natural for her? Remember when you told me about your college professor telling you that dogs praise God with their dogginess and fish praise God with their fishiness? Kitties with their kittiness? Doesn't this fall under that sort of logic?"

The Rev. begged to differ with me.

And I have to agree with him. I thought about that dead bird all day. I thought it about driving to work. I thought about it as I went through the motions of my day. I thought about it at lunch. I did my best thinking while I was stuck in traffic on the way home. I also thought about the conclusion of the lecture that The Rev.'s professor had given to his students that day. "It's too bad humans don't praise God with their humaness." I read my entries for the past week this afternoon and all I can do is throw up my hands and say, "Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner." I've been flaunting my humanity like a bad hairdo and getting my fingers all sticky with dissention, resentment, fear, and anger and putting it on parade for all the world to see.

Forgive me. I am sure you have been entertained by my misadventures and misanthropic bent on drivers who need to have their licenses revoked, but I will be making a concerted effort to write more about my time of grace on this earth, and how much I appreciate the blessings that have been entrusted to my grubby hands, rather than what has not been given to me.

I hope I don't bore you.