October 4 – “That’s one really big hair ball”

Freddy started our morning off quite nicely.  I was heading to the front porch, all excited to put out a piece of mail – our final car payment.  Sitting there in one of her favorite spots was dear old Freddy.  And on the floor next to her was … something.  I thought at first it was her little stuffed animal friend that she plays with every day.  I reached down and picked it up, all ready to toss it across the room for her to chase down. 

 

But it was not a stuffed animal.  Nope.  It was something … dead.  And all balled up in a circle like it had been swallowed and then spit up as one really big hair ball by a less-that-impressed cat.  It was already in my hands, so I was fascinated to find out what it was.  Or rather what it might have been.  My first thought was a bird.  Maybe in its previous life it had been a wonderfully happy chirper who had fallen into despicable feline hands.  But something was just not quite right with that scenario. 

 

As I rolled it over to inspect the other side I found the obvious answer to our conundrum.  Whiskers.  One side of a clear set of whiskers was reaching out into the air.  And following them to their source within the glob of something-ness led me to a barely discernable, crushed … skull.  Of a rat. 

 

Yep.  Freddy had graced us with one of her wonderful discoveries from nature.  I really don’t know how it reached the state it was in, unless perhaps it had been eaten by an owl and regurgitated in the back yard somehow, waiting for Freddy’s keen, un-Covid-affected sense of smell to uncover it.  What a find.  Uh huh.  Chris wasn’t impressed.  She insisted that I get that creature out of her house immediately.  And when I returned from the outside trash can, she further “encouraged” me to wash my hands.  Three or four times.  Have I mentioned that rats are not her best friends in life, so she surely wants nothing to do with them after death.  She’ll probably be waking up soon with tales of rat-infested nightmares.  Sigh.  Way to go, Freddy.

 

Psalms 34:4 says, “I sought the Lord and he answered me; he delivered me from all my fears.”

 

Father, thank you for all your critters, even when we don’t readily see their purpose.  Please join us at worship today.  Amen.