Of shelter and rain

It had been raining all day. I had been inside working on things and needed a break, so I went out on the porch for a minute to watch the rain. I sat down on the chair on my porch, and Wrigley jumped up on my lap. Damn cat. He's been doing that. This cat knows I don't like him. It's not personal; I actually have more compassion on him than most animals. He was abandoned by his owner, a neighbor who moved away a couple months ago, and we've all been looking out for him since. Like I said, it's not personal. It's just that I don't like cats. Wrigley doesn't seem to mind that detail. If he does, he just ignores it. He's been outside so long now that he just wants to be loved. So, for a few minutes, I loved him.

I held him and pet him. He nuzzled his face in the crook of my elbow, then pawed my stomach the way that a cat will. Spencer used to do that. Spencer was the only cat I ever liked. He was my sister's cat, and he was huge and warm and very loving. He was a cat who gave so much affection. Wrigley's affection is different, though; his affection is not a giving but a taking. He is cold and lonely and he just wants to be loved. You can always tell the difference. You can always sense when the affection is a giving or a taking.

For some reason, it occurred to me while I was holding him that I have always believed I was a "good girl." It's only been this past year that I have realized that I'm not. I recognize that there is no one good among us, no, not one. But I wanted to be good. More than that, I wanted others to believe I was good and praise me for being good. Now I believe that, all this time, everyone else already knew what I didn't know. I think the only person who believed I was a good girl was me.

Makes me wonder what language Wrigley was purring in, if he was saying something in the affection he was asking from me.

While I do believe I am lovable, I no longer believe I am good. I know too well the sin of my heart. I am chief among sinners. I don't care how that sounds or how a stranger to my heart will interpret that. (We are all strangers to each others' hearts, anyway.) Anyone who is close enough to God to understand will only argue that they themselves are the chief and the discussion will simply end.

And I am only lovable because I was created that way. We all were; we are all lovable. It is our intrinsic nature to be loved because God is love, and He made us in His image. We can no more make ourselves unlovable than a tree can make itself a lamp. A tree is a tree; it is what it is. Even a sickly deformed unattractive tree is still a tree. So even the "worst" among us are still lovable. We are lovable because God created us to love us. We are who we are.

The problem is that we don't want to be loved by God; we want to be loved by each other. And we are not good at loving each other at all.

We sacrifice God's love on the altar of desire for love from other people. From our parent, or our peer, or our mate, ad infinitum. All the more do we stab and spill His love when our parent abandons or disappoints us, our friend mistreats or judges us, or our mate rejects or betrays us. Those are the times when we get really angry, and we shake our fists at the sky. I think it's because of how deeply we long to feel with our immediate senses. We want an immediate pay-off in love. We ignore that love is for investment, not withdrawal, and the best investments take commitment over time. We ignore that love is for the giving and not for the taking. We ignore the God who loves us, who made us to love us. We ignore Him, that is, until we need someone to blame.

I do wish God would put some skin on again and get down here. I wish He would show up on my doorstep with some fresh baked chocolate chip cookies, sit next to me on the couch and watch a movie, then climb in bed behind me and turn off the light. I'm sorry, but who doesn't want God right here and right now? Perfect love to feel and touch, right here and right now. When we get too antsy for it, aren't looking in the right place for it, or downright blame it for our pain, we'll settle for some pretty substitutes just to get respite from the rain.

What Wrigley doesn't know is that he has a new home. In two weeks, he is getting picked up by a couple who want him and have been waiting for him but couldn't come by to get him until then. Every day he wanders around thinking that he has no home, but he really does have a home. He really does have a place where he belongs. He just isn't there yet.

I wonder what that will be like for him when he has his own place. His own scratching post, his own sweet spot on the couch, his own bowl with his own food. I wonder what his purr will sound like when he is burrowing his face in the arm of the one who will love him for his life. He will no doubt forget about the momentary warmth of my arm.