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The Cat Celebrates

On the occasion of this most Christian of festivals, The Cats Meow wishes you a very Merry Christmas! Amidst the secularity, political correctness, and commercialism, we hope that you'll find a glimmer of that Spirit for which the holiday was created. If, today, the stress and overindulgences leave you feeling a bit disappointed, look within yourself for the kind of love that cats give -- and tomorrow, go out and find a way to share yourself with others, whether through charity, art, writing, or kindness (whatever your special talent may be). We guarantee that it will make you feel better! May your "Christmas Spirit" last throughout the year!

Christmas cards have long been a seasonal favorite of mine. However, it seems that years ago numerous people decided that it was too expensive to send out Christmas cards. There were many that thought it was too time consuming and stopped altogether. Then there were those that cherished the cards and would wait for the mail to arrive to run to the mailbox when they get home. As they ran they would hope to find a new Christmas Card.

I will not deny it; I get very little pleasure from licking envelopes and searching for snail mail addresses in a world of e-mail laden lives. Yet as e-mail is common among us, we also find self-adhesive stamps, envelopes and return address stickers. You can even plug in your Christmas list into computer and save it year after year so all you do is load the address labels and click print. By the way, these come in self-adhesive sheets as well. Everything can be automated but the signatures – do not cheat and have the computer print your signature. That will be the imprint of your thoughts and wishes. The personal touch should never be pushed aside for a cold computer print out.

For those that feel Christmas cards are too expensive, I have researched the cost. If you take on Wal-Mart or some other retail store – you can find a box of 32 cards for 2.00. Stamps for these 32 cards will cost 11.84. Ink for your printer will cost around .25. This brings the total to $14.09. If you divide this – you will find that it costs you 44 cents to bring a smile to an entire family. Those 44 cents become a cherished item that is hung up on the wall or placed on a table. For that amount of change, you could cause several smiles as people walk by what has now become a Christmas decoration that year in their home. For less than 2 quarters, you have spread loving energy and evoked loving energy from others. Each time someone picks up that card, that person thinks of you kindly. For the mere price of a card and stamp you have blessed others and been blessed your self. Where can you do that today with forty-four cents?

Now comes the ones that say it is too time consuming. It takes you less than 2 minutes to sign, stamp, seal, and address a Christmas card. You can multiply your 2 minutes by 32 cards and come to an hour and four minutes of your time. (I actually have done this task with 60 cards in less than an hour). You spend more time watching 3 commercials on TV that you do addressing a 44 cents Christmas card. Once we have gotten the boring math out of the way, we can begin to reach into our memories and into our hearts and recall stories of Christmas that made us happy. We do not even have to stay in the distant past but stray into the recent past as well.

As a child, I remember rushing to the mailbox to pull out the Christmas cards. I lived in Kentucky so it promised to be cold if not snowy as I as I reached into the metal box with my heart pounding with excitement. I would pull out the days mail and dig through it quickly looking for an envelope that resembled a Christmas card or to see a return address of a relative or a friend of our families. If by chance that day I found one, I would run as fast as my little legs could take me screaming to my parents that we had a card. Most times, I was allowed to open it and they would pass it around and look at it. No one ever failed to smile.

After the card had passed through the hands of everyone there, we grabbed a roll of tape and taped it along the doorways. It added to the holiday decorations and we would go by and occasional stop and look across our cards again. Each day I would run out to the mailbox and repeat the ritual of Christmas card hunting in a small metal mailbox.

Back then, it wasn’t unusual to receive 100 to 200 cards. (*sighs* - I am beginning to sound old). I remember hearing my mom on the phone talking to aunts and her friends, a s they would share with each other how many cards they had received and how many they had sent out. It almost seemed like it showed how much a person was thought of by how many cards they received. In a silly kind of logic, they were right. It told how many people thought you were worth 2 minutes of their time and the cost of a card and a stamp.

Today I am 47 years old and as Christmas approaches, I start to eye the mailbox as does my sons. As the Christmas cards start coming in, their younger legs beat mine to reach into the mailbox and look for Christmas cards. I simply chuckle and tell them I will get it next time. Yet even my children know how happy the cards make me.

I realize there are many who can not afford to send a card and some that can not complete the tasks it takes. These are the people need all the Christmas wishes and help we can give them.

This year as it has been for the last four Christmases here with Steve – we will stand them up on the large handcrafted dining room table that Steve designed and created. When we run out of room there, we will put them around the doorways. As we walk around them each day, we will look at them and sometimes pick them up. As every year since I can remember …… we will smile.

This little lesson on love and life is about the price of a blessings - what is it worth?

"There's no point in being grown up if you can't be childish sometimes. "
                                           Doctor Who

Reprinted from www.rhiannonwaits.com

A Kitten's Twelve Days of Christmas Mischief...
or The Holiday Adventures of Baby Sara

On the first day of Christmas,
my kitten ruined for me...
A batch of my special hand-print cookies. I had turned my back to grab the cookie sheet sitting on the stove. In that micro-second, Sara climbed onto the table, poked her paw into the delightfully kneady mixture and, suddenly off- balance, fell into the cookie dough. Net loss? Six cups of flour, four cups of sugar, three sticks of butter.... Of course, it would have been cheaper to remove the feline ingredient, pick out the hairs, and just rename the recipe Paw Print Cookies.

On the second day of Christmas,
my kitten accompanied me..
On a trip to the vet clinic. Who knew that skinny curling ribbon has feline taste appeal? I didn't. Damages: $28.00 for the office visit, $36.00 for anesthesia so the veterinarian could take $55.00 X-rays in case Sara had taste-tested any other Christmas decorations, and a heck of a lot of embarrassment when the vet removed the 3' curly tail in slightly less than two seconds by tugging at it with a pair of tweezers.

On the third day of Christmas,
my kitten wrecked for me...
13 ornaments on my Christmas tree. My mistake was forgetting to chain the decorations to the branches. My other error was leaving the room to go to the bathroom while Sara feigned sleeping under the tree. How was I to know she was actually measuring its climbing potential? Value of broken bulbs? $7.50 plus tax.

On the fourth day of Christmas,
my kitten broke for me...
A statue in my Lenox Nativity. Would you believe two Wise men plus a head? Lenox nativity figurines: $55.99.

A Carol For Children
By Ogden Nash (1902-1971)

God rest you merry, Innocents,
Let nothing you dismay,
Let nothing wound an eager heart
Upon this Christmas day.

Yours be the genial holly wreaths,
The stockings and the tree;
An aged world to you bequeths
Its own forgotten glee.

Soon, soon enough come crueler gifts,
The anger and the tears;
Between you now there sparsely drifts
A handful yet of years.

Oh, dimly, dimly glows the star
Through the electric throng;
The bidding in temple and bazaar
Drowns out the silver song.

The ancient altars smoke afresh,
The ancient idols stir;
Faint in the reek of burning flesh
Sink frankincense and myrrh.

Gaspar, Balthazar, Melchior!
Where are your offerings now?
What greetings to the Prince of War,
His darkly branded brow?

Two ultimate laws alone we know,
The ledger and the sword --
So far away, so long ago,
We lost the infant Lord.

Only the children clasp His hand;
His voice speaks low to them,
And still for them the shining band
Wings over Bethlehem.

God rest you merry, Innocents,
While innocence endures,
A sweeter Christmas than we to ours
May you bequeath to yours.

Reprinted from Life's Adventures

Cat-ty Links To Share

Meowy Christmas(online greeting)

Christmas Gullibility Test (quiz) (No cats, just some fascinating facts)

Cats Gone Wild (Possible "adult humor")

Cat Posties and Flash Movies