Here, kitty, kitty!

This is an excerpt from a sermon I wrote for a pet blessing service after my dear dad died three summers ago. 

Growing up on a busy cattle farm, animals fell into several different categories. There were animals we raised to make a living and for food – cattle and pigs. There were the animals we loved – the cats and dogs. And the ones that were a nuisance – the mice in the walls of our old farm house, raccoons that ate the sweet corn before it ripened, the moles that created lumpy paths through my mom’s garden, coyotes that howled at night, an unwelcome romantic tomcat wandering through, and for a short time a horse named Ginger that would intentionally saunter under the apple tree to casually knock off anyone brave enough to hop onto her saddle.

Today we remember and bless the animals we love. Each year on the farm, it was fun to discover and tame the litters of kittens that were born– some in the barn, some in the shed, once in a bucket of nails in my dad’s shop. Farm life could get boring and lonely and those cats provided us with hours of fun and companionship. As my own children and their cousins have grown, they have also enjoyed finding, taming and naming each one. They never met a kitten they couldn’t love. Though there were often several that looked so alike I had trouble telling them apart, the kids knew without a doubt which one was Mittens and which one was Scruffy, which one was Midnight and which one was Hombre. 

There weren’t many kittens this year at the farm and some were too wild to catch. And it also appears the gene pool has been totally depleted. Every single kitten was gray. No pretty calico kitties, no sleek black ones, no classic brown striped cats. They were all gray. 

In June, as my dad was growing sicker and the doctors narrowed down a diagnosis for him, there was one friendly gray kitten abandoned near the house. It hid in the downspout by the garage. He ran along the length of the porch and tried to get in the house whenever the door opened. My nieces made a special concoction of yogurt and milk that its small tummy could tolerate and they were determined to keep that kitten alive. About the same time, up in the barn was another gray kitten whose mother went missing. This one had long, fluffy hair and was so frightened, he hid behind whatever he could find and had to be coaxed out. My nieces brought both kittens down to dad’s shop, found a litter box they vowed to empty every day, and promised it would only be for a little while until they were big enough to fend for themselves outside with the rest of the cats. 

My dad had good days and bad days, nearly all of them filled with naseau and pain. Those two kittens became his companions. Very early one morning, I went down to have coffee with him in his shop and found one kitten playing with the pencils on his desk in the office while the other one hid behind a file cabinet. “I was never going to have cats in my shop,” he lamented. “Never.” 

On the farm, pets belonged outside – not in the house, not in dad’s shop. But here were these two kittens, wrestling at his feet. The more aggressive kitten pounced on the other and they rolled across the floor and dad laughed at their antics. “Is this on your list of things that don’t matter anymore?” I asked him. He was dying. “Yes it is,” he said as he coaxed the fluffy kitten out from behind the cabinet and onto his lap. 

As the summer progressed, they hid in the drawers of his work bench, jumping out to surprise him. They stretched out onto his lap while he did his breathing treatments and poked their heads into his coffee cup. On the days that nausea won and he didn’t want any company, he could still tolerate those kittens. 

One hot afternoon, I stopped down to check on him and one kitten was sprawled on his lap, chewing on his shirt. “Look,” Dad said, “He thinks I’m his mother.” This became a weird, wonderful pattern – dad would sit in his usual spot to use the nebulizer or drink his coffee and the cat would hop out from one of his drawers to chew on his shirt. The dog, Kate, never straying too far from her place by dad’s feet.

An old dog and two playful kittens. This probably was not exactly what the psalmist had in mind when he said that God places all things under our feet. A dog and two kittens – this also wasn’t exactly the medicine the doctors prescribed when dad decided not to seek treatment for his cancer. But they were as effective as any comfort measures the doctor recommended. 

Today as we talk about blessing animals, we also share our stories about how God can use animals and all of creation to bless us. Regardless of your relationships with these creatures - and I plan to keep my distance from that lizard over there - I hope that we can all find a place in our hearts to recognize and celebrate the blessings that pets can bring into our lives and the lives of those around us. We give thanks to God for all the ways that love, companionship, and grace enter into our lives. 

Psalm 8:3-9

When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars that you have established;
what are human beings that you are mindful of them,
mortals that you care for them?

Yet you have made them a little lower than God,
and crowned them with glory and honor.
You have given them dominion over the works of your hands;
you have put all things under their feet,
all sheep and oxen, and also the beasts of the field,
the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea,
whatever passes along the paths of the seas.

O Lord, our Sovereign, how majestic is your name in all the earth!

I love you, teachers.

Our daughter, a high school freshman, had an end-of-year Spanish project due today. Each of the students was given a tale from a book of stories and asked to prepare a lesson for the class. Sarah was assigned an odd story about a dog who liked to collect rocks and then spent several days practicing and honing her lesson plan. She was ready.

After school, under my careful interrogation, she admitted that the lesson went "fine" and then hit the couch with her phone, a snack and the remote. Apparently, all is well.

I was reminded of her first attempts at Spanish years ago. Señor Rios had placed twelve pictures on the wall, one for each of their vocabulary words. As luck would have it, Sarah was the first to be handed a pointer and instructed to identify each picture, standing in front of the whole class. As we climbed into the car to go home that afternoon, I asked, worried, "How was that for you?" Our painfully-shy-in-public first grader said, "I got 13 out of 12. There are two words for ink pen."

"Wow," I replied quietly, wondering how she had managed that challenge, "What did Señor Rios say?"

"I can't tell you," she said and clammed up completely.

All the way home, her older brother and I offered up possibilities, hoping to solve the mystery:

"Good job?"
"Bravo?"
"Well done?"
"¡Prima!"
"Awesome!"
"¡Muy bien!"
"¡Excellente!?"
"Way to go!"

Baffled, we must have guessed more than a hundred times, but she rejected each one. Though we begged, she refused to elaborate.

Not long after we arrived home, Sarah silently handed me a small slip of paper folded in half, then skedaddled to her room and closed the door. When I unfolded the paper, reading the three words she had written, I immediately understood why she had been too embarrassed to tell us what the teacher had exclaimed in front of the class.

"I love you."

In a moment of exuberance for a job well done, those powerful words from a teacher might have been just the wrong thing to say to the wrong student. Or just the right thing to say to the right student. From Sarah's reaction, it was hard to tell.

By the age of six or seven, she had heard the words "I love you" countless times, primarily from adoring extended family and protective parents. But as they grow into adolescence, healthy children need three or four or more non-parent role models and mentors and others to hold them accountable, to encourage, to teach, to discipline, to know and yes, even to love them.

Near the end of another school year, I'm so grateful for teachers and for the important part they play in helping our children discover and use their gifts, make and learn from mistakes, take turns and share, listen and speak and dream. ¡Gracias!

Remember you are dust

When one of our members, age 90+, took a tumble that landed her in transitional care, I stopped by to say hello. It was no surprise that she was down in the dumps. Transitions can be difficult at any age, but are especially painful when decisions about housing and mobility and even personal care are no longer fully yours to make. A fall can herald harsh and sudden change - my church friend was unsettled about what had happened and uncertain about the future.

Into a lull in the conversation, I announced, "It's Ash Wednesday," though it was redundant.The enormous cross on my forehead from the early service had already broadcast this fact.

"Oh," she said, clearly dejected. "I wish I had some ashes. That would really cheer me up."

This Eeyore-like response spoke such volumes about her predicament. Alive but not fully living - at least not as she hoped.

"Don't I have a pretty big cross on my forehead?" I asked, knowing it had been applied by my pastor-husband who had never once skimped on the ashes.

"Oh, yes, you certainly do," she agreed.

"I'll share."

"You'll need a mirror," she immediately declared, "Use mine." In the bathroom, I used my thumb to remove as much ash as I could from my forehead while muttering "What are you doing?" to my reflection.

We sat on the awkward low-to-the floor bed like girlfriends at a sleepover as I traced a whisper of a cross onto her brow. It was a holy highlight in the disorienting and fear-filled day after a fall. We held hands as we prayed together, not knowing what the earthly future holds - but giving thanks for the gift of life and for God's persistent, loving claim on us from beginning to end. And for the promise of new life to come.