Be Still My Heart

I ran into Bruce. I was at the co-op, putting up a home wanted flier, about the nine cat family. He came up behind me, said "Do you remember me?" Of course I did.

He was the man of the couple who adopted Stinod, the mostly blind mostly deaf kitty, from the Tattoo Prairie colony.

He wanted to tell me how much they love her, how much she has blossomed, how much he adores her and she adores them. She plays with them, without claws out, bugs him in his office for attention, but recently had surgery for a wound on her back. Apparently a cat broke through their old cat door, attacking her. They're getting her a harness so they can take her outside.

My heart was pounding as he spoke. I could hardly contain my joy.

And why should I?

I told him how much this meant to me, to hear these things.

I cry now to think of it. To think of how she was, with that eye so horrible she couldn't see out there, how she'd been like that for six months, the man said, who fed her, who claimed she was his favorite cat. I had to net her. Then she had that eye removed. She thrived afterwards and loved it here, but she stayed out in the cat yard, to avoid conflicts with some of my "bitch" cats, if she bumped into them accidentally. She'd feel her way around and better not move anything.

She climbed the trees in the yard. She let nothing get in the way of her enjoyment of life.

And now, of all cats, this blind mostly deaf kitty is adored! Can you imagine?

There's always hope.

Redemption is a helping hand away.

I get discouraged. There is great suffering in this world and evil. But there is also great beauty and good.

I have to remember Stinod. I have to believe. I want to believe.

Be still my heart, pounding like it is, with joy.