Dixie Dillon Lane
It was a Friday morning and my brother, a teacher who lives next door to us, had a full class of middle schoolers in his backyard practicing wood chopping skills. My kids, who are homeschooled, were of course watching them through the window instead of doing their math assignments.
All of a sudden the happy chatter of my children’s commentary turned indignant. “Mom!” They shouted. “Uncle John just dropped a cat over the fence into our yard!”
And that is how Girl Cat joined our family. Having been tossed over the gate when she, a stray, tried to distract the students, she was now committed to distracting us. Forever.
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We tried to get her to move along. We really did! Our other cats hissed at her. My husband and I talked solemnly about the foolishness of taking on more vet bills while we were also saving for a new car. We reminded ourselves that we already had two cats, one dog, and six chickens (not to mention four children). But she just camped out on our porch, and stayed.
After a day or two of this, I brought her inside and cuddled her for a few minutes — and then panicked and put her out the back door before anyone noticed. We put food and water out for her (she was skinny!). We worried about her being outside in the cold overnight, and began bringing her inside at dusk. We took her to the animal shelter to have her checked for a microchip (she had none). We declared weakly to the children that we absolutely were not keeping this cat.
Soon, however, we had given Girl Cat a pink, flowery collar. Then, she got a crate when her tail started bleeding and she needed a quiet place to nap. The vet gave her a shot for her tail and took $200 from our car fund. Our friend Matt pointed out that, as much as we denied it, we were behaving as though this was, in fact, our cat. As a lifelong Trekkie, I started calling her “the Borg cat” because, of course, resistance was futile.
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As we watched our children, their friends, and our newly enlarged panoply of animals playing in the yard together, my husband and I commented that sometimes good things come into your life in surprising ways, and at surprising times. Like many people, our family has been through a lot in the past year: rising costs, health scares, and plenty of things breaking down while few seem to be building up. We’ve had many blessings too, of course, including everything we truly need: a home, good food, good work, and each other. Yet sometimes we can pay too much attention to the negative, even when we are surrounded by love. Fortunately, God has a way of reminding us that the forward motion of life is the strongest force that exists, far stronger than car worries, or health trouble, or whatever it is that’s currently straining our sense of hopefulness. The children will keep laughing their golden peals of laughter. The leaves will turn golden, the sunshine will slant through the window, and the first snowflakes will fall. We sit together in the evenings and read aloud by the fireside. All this costs us nothing, but fills our souls with life.
And now we have a new cat — a new reminder that we always have space to welcome a little more life into our hearts. When those with even the smallest needs tug at our heartstrings, they often bring unforeseen blessings. Girl Cat has certainly done so. Not only do her antics make us laugh every day, but she comforts our children after they scrape their knees, and she snuggles with our dog in the way the other cats flatly refuse to do. And the neighbors simply love her — even Uncle John. She makes everyone happier just by being our little cat.
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She also reminds us that not only cats have the power to bless us unexpectedly: It’s also the college student who has nowhere to go for his holiday meal, or the shut-in who is living off of frozen dinners, or the grandmother whose own grandchildren live far away and gazes at your passel of small hooligans longingly. When we look generously outward toward others when we’re feeling down ourselves, a strange thing happens. Instead of collapsing under the weight of it all, our hearts somehow seem to expand. When we say yes to the pleading of a child to “keep the cat,” or we read the same picture book aloud for the third time in a row, or we sit with a grieving friend even though we don’t know how to help, we strike a powerful blow against darkness.
So while I don’t recommend that you actively seek out six chickens, three cats, and one dog when you already have plenty on your plate, there’s something very fruitful about letting life in when it knocks on the door. “Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God,” we read in Hebrews 13:16. This is not a counsel against prudence; sometimes we do too much, and we need to steward our resources and our energies. Burnout helps no one. But it is a reminder that, as one of my dear friends always reminds me, you often really can “just do things.” You don’t have to sit there in fear (although you should certainly make time to sit there and nap!). Instead, you can welcome life. You can bake cookies and go to free movie screenings and hold a friend’s baby during Mass and encourage friends and neighbors and build them up (1 Thess. 5:11).
And it surely will come back to encourage and enliven you as well — even if only in the form of a cat.
