"IF I WERE KING OF THE FOREST"

COURAGE

The Lion in "The Wizard of Oz" was seeking

courage.

How very silly! I am much smaller than that Lion and

I am very brave. My dearest wish is to tangle with the

Three Cats that traverse my backyard!

I would show Mitt, Spike and Basement Cat a thing or three!

(But I digress.)

Dede and I have been discussing courage ever since we read

the blog of my GodCat, The Rev. Deborah Dunn.

She wrote very eloquently about three people that are very

courageous. It's title is "Recovery", but I think it is really about their bravery in facing something that will change their lives forever.

I asked Dede if she has courage and she said it was

"the whistling past the graveyard" kind.

She says it is a pretend courage, but that she has never had

to display courage for anything that has happened to her

because she has led such a blah life. Many others that she cares about have faced all sorts of things and have shown great

courage.

She says that the hardest kind of pretend courage to display is

the kind you must show when someone you love is in trouble.

Dede says that she can't remember a time in her life when she

hasn't been responsible for the care of someone. She says

maybe when she was at university, but that was a very short time. Before that, she had two brothers that she took care of  and then she got married and there was John and soon there was Deborah, my GodCat, and then John Andrew and then Bill and, of course, many Cats.

Dede says that when you have a family so many things happen and some of them are very sad and you have to pretend to be very brave even when your insides feel like Rice Krispies. Sometimes the Rice Krispies get soggy from tears and sometimes they keep snap, crackle and popping long after what made them appear is gone. She says that those are

the worst kind.

Dede says she admires courage more than any other trait and that is why she is so inspired by Deborah's choices for her "profiles in courage."

Bishop J. Jon Bruno, Valerie Ward, Simon Cunningham --

names to remember and to admire.

Dede wishes she could be like them.

Because I am fearless, maybe I can help her.

Meanwhile, as Dan Rather used to say,

"COURAGE!!"

Love from Me. Mab.