A high school friend recently commented on my facebook photo, "Susan, you've been petting that bunny a long time now." I laughed. Micki, a friend of old, used to share dinner with me and our spouses in the home where my bunny fetish began.
I didn't set out to fall for bunnies. And my house isn't full of bunny trinkets and statues. Okay. A cute one made from parasite wood sits on my piano. (I bought it at our Go Fish store!)
Still, when your husband battles a brain stem tumor and your mere existence requires a relentless pursuit of hope, you find it in the oddest places. For a time, I found it in the evening hours when a family of bunnies hopped out from behind a shed that rested against the right side of our fenced in back yard.
They didn't show themselves every day and when they did, they snuck out with the greatest of care. Squirrels ran relentless all day. Bunnies appeared in the haze of twilight just before darkness crept in. When I caught them in action, hope lept inside and broke through the haze of an internal twilight that threatened to fade into darkness.
I know this isn't logical, theological, or even Biblical. But over time, the sight of bunnies lifted me high, reminding me of the contractual promise represented by a rainbow: God will carry mankind (and me) through the storm.
After I read Micki's post on facebook, I realized I haven't been petting a bunny all this time. I've been touching hope. And I've been touching hope all along because I found that bunny in the Virginia hospital where Baby Catherine was taken only hours after she born.
Baby Catherine, my first step-granddaughter, born last August, was not expected to live. A diaphragmatic hernia hampered her ability to grow enough lung power to sustain life. God broke in with His miracle touch and gave her just enough lung capacity to keep her on this side of eternity. Nine months later, she's still with us. She's lived in the hospital just about as long as she's lived at home. None the less, our miracle baby is smiling, growing, and slowly healing.
Check out: http://www.letterstocatherine.blogspot.com/ for her amazing story as recorded by her mom.
When the emotion of it all sent me looking for a hospital chapel a few days after she was born, I missed the elevators, walked a long corridor, and found that bunny--that big, fluffy, white bunny--right down the hall from the NICU behind a large glass window. The second time I visited the bunny, someone offered to let me in the room where the bunny lived and opened his cage so I could touch hope.
Don took the photo.
Nathan claims he's going to buy me a bunny when he goes to college. I don't know that I want a baby bunny to clean and pamper while I miss my oldest son.
Still, I like the surprise of finding them when I least expect them. I like the thrill of hope their presence stirs inside. Deep down, for whatever crazy reason, I just like bunnies.
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