Little daily blessings

The ability to find the little daily blessings is a skill that I try to work on a lot these days, even while I deal with the eternal crabbiness of impending menopause. I've never been a patient person, but at this age, as I near 49, patience is a highly priced commodity in my life. That's why I love quilting, because it forces me to be patient.

Having five animals, while not generally contributing to the patience department since they all have their quirks and needs and decidedly maddening traits, also forces me to try to be more patient since animals, especially dogs, are keenly attuned to non-verbal cues, and Chiquita, as a Chihuahua, is extremely sensitive to any cross look or pose or tone.

Hamlet, on the other hand, is pretty much inured and immune to anything that doesn't suit his mood. These days, he's mostly going out the back door to come around to the front of the house, looking for the raccoon that he tousled with a few weeks' back, and then begging to be let in so he can repeat the routine again. Talk about cultivating patience when you become a door-woman for a cat.

More recently, he's decided that if he hides below the bird bath, perhaps a clueless bird will miss his girth and blackness and his very loud bell (his collar snaps off so that he can't get in trouble if it gets caught), and actually become his prey. We could think of Hamlet as hopeful, but I prefer to suggest that his IQ isn't very impressive in cat (or any other) terms.

My husband often says: "I had a fish," when we begin conversations about how frustrating (and expensive!!) life with five animals can be. And he's right. When I met him, my husband had a goldfish named Aureliano, who eventually died. When I suggested I'd replace the fish, my then-husband-to-be adamantly refused.

In marrying me, his life got a lot more complicated, first with two cats, then one dog, then another cat who adopted us, then another dog who adopted us, then only two dogs when the two old cats died, but then there was a new cat and then another when we moved to Ohio and then the two old dogs died and there was one new dog and then Hamlet and then Chiquita.

But, as challenging as it can be, I guess that "raising" five creatures is a lot like motherhood. There are many difficulties and low points and times when I wish I'd never had any of them, or that I could give them back, but, ultimately, the devotion they offer and the laughs they give are part of those little blessings of life that sometimes make a hard day more bearable and a good day even better.