What does 2026 know, that 2025 can’t imagine?
How big can we dream, here on the porch swing between two years?
A year ago, we had never seen the cheeks of Clifford. The world is warmer and weirder now, and we can’t imagine life without our coconut curmudgeon.
Twelve months back, there was no Corduroy in our quilt. We never knew we were threadbare until he stitched laughter over our sorrows, and bravery through our fears.
When we rang in 2025, there was a gap in the song, but now it has been filled by a garland of Willow. How did we even know our own names without her chirps to remind us?
If 2025 had told us how much we would love the family we did not yet know, 2024 would not have believed it.
But perhaps it is best that a year keeps its secrets.
If we knew in January that Grecca would not see spring, we would have called off Valentine’s Day and cursed the wiles of winter. Grief is greedy enough without stealing the time we still had together.
Or how could we bear being parted from Boobalah twice: once in warning, and once in weeping? We would not have had the strength. Courage is given in the hour it is needed, not before.
Had you warned us that our littlest “FeLVies” would face a bitter alphabet soup, we would have been scared. But when FIP came, Kitty Purry and Leonardo DiCatrio needed us to be our best, unhindered by fright. And when FIP left, what remained was a bond stronger than all fear.
A New Year’s brightest diamonds often look like stones.
We would never have wanted Bologna to be returned after getting adopted. Had we known, we would have judged, and had we judged, we would have already lost. But if Bologna did not come back, he could not have gone forth to the place he always belonged, his true forever home. Sometimes there is a wait at the delicatessen.
Who would choose to strand two Jersey birds in the heart of Texas, with only a microchip to point their way home? Yet, Canary and Archer’s adoption was not a failure, just a dress rehearsal. Winging them home was not an inconvenience, but an adventure. They, too, begin 2026 in their forever home.
As a matter of fact, it was all an adventure, end to end.
Didn’t we have a time, teaching Taro that there is tenderness after the tempest?
Wasn’t it sweet, saving a Darling Dozen daredevils the size of Ding-Dongs?
Weren’t we tycoons, entrusted with Shirley and Mr. Rogers and Squentin Tarantino and Smoothie and, and … and … and …
… doesn’t it make you tremble to imagine how much love will fill our lives between now and next December?
There are treasures in the palm of 2026’s hand, too grand for words to tell.
There are friends who will become family, and cats who will save us by letting us save them.
There are callings bigger than we are, and strength that will arrive on time.
There are miracles we are too shy to pray for, but they will be given anyway.
What does 2026 know? We dare not say. But it’s shared this much: we will face it together.
And if we get it right, we’ll all be even closer this time next year than we are today.
Happy New Year, Tabby’s Place family.