Maggie, Cat and 4-footed Theologian
We were wondering last week how God might want us around if we contribute only problems, and no real help. Maggie can explain this one easily. She is useless. She doesn't do a lick of work around the house, ever. She never catches mice, cockroaches or any other vermin, as cats are ordained to do. She doesn't even catch flies, even when they are slow and many, like another cat we once knew.
She poops in the house now and then if she's mad about something, is very picky about her chow, and regularly misses the catbox when she pees. We don't need the Haber-Bosch process to produce ammonia in our house. From an accountant's viewpoint, this family member is not a profit center.
But even though she has had some bad times, being left with strangers sometimes for years when Gayle couldn't take care of her, she knows that none of this matters. She knows that her place is in the house of Attwood, with Gayle and her other humans.
Of course she has to practice Paul's advice to put up with one another. She thought she finally had us trained, giving her delicious fish for a week. But then we backslid last week and opened a can of turkey, which we ought to know by now has no place under her nose. She is disgusted, but she still works with us - love believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Even the wise are in some ways invincibly foolish, as we see in Solomon's case. I was remarking last week for the umpteenth time that she still hasn't figured out that standing right behind me when I'm working in the kitchen leads to getting her feet and tail stepped on, which she doesn't like at all - she issues the meow to prove it every time. But then I considered for the first time that she has only had 16 years to wise up, whereas in some things I've been just as immune to experience after more than 50 years.
Thus it remains as Isaiah said, "The ox knows its owner, and the ass its master's manger, but my people do not know me, says the Lord." Maggie the Cat, Th.D., likewise has a few things to teach!
She poops in the house now and then if she's mad about something, is very picky about her chow, and regularly misses the catbox when she pees. We don't need the Haber-Bosch process to produce ammonia in our house. From an accountant's viewpoint, this family member is not a profit center.
But even though she has had some bad times, being left with strangers sometimes for years when Gayle couldn't take care of her, she knows that none of this matters. She knows that her place is in the house of Attwood, with Gayle and her other humans.
Of course she has to practice Paul's advice to put up with one another. She thought she finally had us trained, giving her delicious fish for a week. But then we backslid last week and opened a can of turkey, which we ought to know by now has no place under her nose. She is disgusted, but she still works with us - love believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Even the wise are in some ways invincibly foolish, as we see in Solomon's case. I was remarking last week for the umpteenth time that she still hasn't figured out that standing right behind me when I'm working in the kitchen leads to getting her feet and tail stepped on, which she doesn't like at all - she issues the meow to prove it every time. But then I considered for the first time that she has only had 16 years to wise up, whereas in some things I've been just as immune to experience after more than 50 years.
Thus it remains as Isaiah said, "The ox knows its owner, and the ass its master's manger, but my people do not know me, says the Lord." Maggie the Cat, Th.D., likewise has a few things to teach!
posted by Peter Attwood at 12/16/2008 11:29:00 PM
1 Comments:
Maggie is a very sweet kitty, and she is very affectionate. I like to think of her as the one who taught me how to give and receive unconditional love. No matter what an idiot I am, no matter how fat I am or out of style in dress, no matter how much I don't fit into the "norm," whatever that is, she still loves me. That's doing a lot.
Gayle
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