Dear Honored Guests,
This is the day when we give thanks.
If we knew the glory of being alive, we would give thanks every day.
But unlike you, we are only human, so today is one day we remember to remember.
Before the Tofurkeys take center stage and all the little cousins start flicking cranberries at each other, I would like to thank you.
Thank you for being cats.
You are honesty incarnate, hairy empaths unafraid to say “I love you” in more than words. Your egos are larger than football stadiums, yet you fold yourselves to fit our laps.
You high-five the universe every time you remember you are alive. You constantly remember you are alive.
And yet, you have amnesia when it comes to the past.
You yowl about famine ten minutes after dinner. If someone stops petting you to stir the stuffing, you lament that you are neglected and forsaken.
But mostly, your forgetfulness is a form of genius.
While we are still upset that we had a hangnail last year, you refuse to remember that you nearly died.
That is how you became our Honored Guests in the first place.
The six of you were born in Beirut, where rubble pierced your toes, and food was more “rumor” than “reliable.”
People with their own hurts and hungers came for you. They made your survival their number one need.
There are no words for such people. They astonish the angels. They are the persistence of life and the power of love. They are a breathing “Thanksgiving.”
They are the reason you still have breath.
You don’t remember, but we can’t forget the stories your rescuers told.
Twix, you were the littlest, fun-sized in a world without play. Your hips were both broken, and you huffed and puffed in shallow gasps.
Ricky, your tabby stripes were a map of fractures, old-man injuries in a kitten’s body.
Odessa, green-eyed and good, you survived an explosion, only to face FIP’s pyrotechnics.
Obi, golden as dawn, your insides and your innocence took fire from air strikes.
Spain, your flowing locks stopped short at the leg you lost.
And Peeka, all dignity on silver toes, you walked in hunger with no promise of reaching the other side.
You learned that Tabby’s Place is a sanctuary for Honored Guests. Our mission statement calls you “cats from hopeless situations,” but you know who you are.
You are cats too much alive for death’s greedy hands.
You are the sum of everyone who loved you along the way, Earth’s true leaders whose names may never be known this side of Heaven.
You are the triumph of mercy in a ragged world.
You are Thanksgiving.
Thank you for being here. I do not mean America, much less New Jersey. I mean here, in this hour, where love is both host and feast.
I mean here, at this table, where we never run out of chairs or laps.
Some say you are resilient. Forgiving. They are correct.
But mostly, you are Thanksgiving.
You are Twix, the soulful somersault, with eyes like the dots on exclamation points. Isn’t it wonderful? Isn’t it wonderful? Have you seen all this “wonderful?” You can’t believe you get to be here. You can’t stop reminding us that we also get to be here.
You are Ricky, wriggly as a glow worm, lighting candelabras where others glimpse gloom. You are wrestling Twix as though this is the Featherweight Championship of the World, and perhaps it is.
You are Odessa, overcome by all this sweetness. Survival would have been enough, but there are marshmallows on that sweet potato. You melt for every kindness as though it were the first.
You are Obi, passing the casserole of comfort so all can partake. You are infatuated with the ordinary, besotted with the biscuit of a normal day. (You have been adopted!)
You are Spain, ticklish beneath your beard and tickled that three (legs) is indeed a perfect number. (You have been adopted … and Firestar is now your brother!)
You are Peeka, becoming empty of anger now that your belly is full.
Thank you for coming all this way.
You crossed the Atlantic. But much more, you crossed the expanse that we assume is impassible. You came from fear to love.
You are the hope that overcomes “situations.”
You are Thanksgiving.
Thank you.