It’s funny, the way you need don’t need as much sleep the older you get. I battled insomnia for so many excruciating years. These days, sleep comes easier to me, just not as much. That’s how I find myself in the kitchen by 5:30 am most mornings. Typically, that amounts to around 7 hours of semibliss, minus the tossing and turning that comes with one arm that is prone to needles, a bad hip, and many trips to the bathroom. It’s all good. There is coffee to make and many cats to feed. On the morning in question, I start off with the OG cats, Olive & Hazel. They eat their kibble from a set of delft blue china bowls that belonged to my late mom. Momma loved delft china. The bowl bottoms have a picture of Denbigh Castle in Wales. Hazel and Olive both attack their kibble with gusto, much like the battles Denbigh endured. Our newest cats, Polly & Sully, eat from tiny Noritake china tea saucers, baby Sully eating a few bites from his and a few bites from his older half-sister’s plate. Next, eyes still mostly closed and crazy hair attempting to escape from the sleeping bun I have yet to perfect, I stumble onto the porch. Sully’s mom (Polly’s too) is a crazy feral cat we named Peach but only seem to call Momma Cat. She bounds onto the porch as soon as she hears the lock turn on the deadbolt. With her are always the two kittens from her last litter we were never able to capture and rehome, along with her beau and baby daddy, Bowser. That’s his government name. We call him Puff Daddy. With a house full of happy felines, I grab my coffee from the Keurig, fish around for the spare glasses I keep in the kitchen junk drawer, and sink into the corner of a massive black velvet sofa I proudly thrifted for next to nothing. My feet go up on an ottoman covered in discontinued Waverly black toile fabric I snatched for a song from a Goodwill store many years ago. I grab my favorite cozy blanket. And, there I sit for a good long while, breathing deeply, talking to God, and praying all the prayers I can summon while a parade of sweet cats alternate snuggles with me. It’s what I call peace seeking. It has taken me 56.5 years to get it down.
So many terrible things have happened in the world lately. I will spare you my rendition of both the timeline and the political rhetoric. I am not knowledgeable enough on either topic to educate anyone. My exasperation lies in how I am still surprised by such horrors. I should have remembered. The world likes to eat things. The world likes to spit things back out. When my husband was a little boy, his grandfather loved gathering his grandsons for scary story time. The villain in his stories was always a monster named Bloody Bones. BB preyed on children, probably
ill-mannered or flatout mean ones. He was apt to either grind or pick his teeth with their bones. The story seems to be very fluid when pertaining to these details. That is what the world seems like to me, sharpening its teeth on the most innocent. Yet, I continue to return to the world looking for things like peace and goodness. The world keeps disappointing me, telling me lies instead. “A little greed is ok. YOU deserve it.” “Everyone is doing it. Go ahead. It’s not that bad.” “No one will know. Don’t worry.” I will spare you my life lessons. Just know that the world over promises and under delivers every single time, bones and all.
On the particular morning in question, sitting in my comfy spot, I asked God to give me peace. I told Him I did not deserve peace. I realized it was fleeting, intangible, and maybe a very selfish ask. I prayed for all the parents who recently lost a child to violence. That loss is nearly unsurvivable, but to add the element of harm to the equation gives my gut a desperate, queasy feeling that makes tears prick the backs of my eyes. “Just for a second, God. Just settle me for a moment or two. That’s plenty - just a glimpse of your grace.” That’s when I heard the noise. I had forgotten that the grandkids had spent the night and were camped out in the guest room in sleeping bags. One hit the other with a wayward elbow. There was a curdling scream, followed by a thud. The spell was broken. The krakens were released. How blessed I am, to live in a world where grandchildren run free through my house and the bad guys are only in old stories. That’s God’s peace for you - wrapped in a noisy child who knows not the evil that lies in wait. I’ll take that grace, bones and all.
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