Posted by Loulou on Mar 16, 2016 | 4 comments

Me, waking up to get my “twigs” in order.

So I was thinking, while I watched mama make a fire in our fireplace with tiny twigs, then bigger ones and then two big logs–where do you learn those things because mama loved to make fires (she would be a great pyromaniac, haha), and she said, “Loulou, I was a Girl Scout”, which meant zilch to me of course but then I got the whole spiel about fire-building and lanyard weaving and picture-frame-making-out-of-tree-branches and by the end I was about to nod off.

But, mama said, you learn a lot of things in the Girl Scouts but one really nice thing I learned was in the Brownie Scouts, which comes before you graduate to the Big Time. (The Brownie Scouts taught mama that smiling was important.)

And what was that, I asked?  Well, she said, the fire I had to make had to contain only three twigs, then the slightly larger ones and then the big ones, but the three twigs were the most important element, and they are called “tinder”.  The second ones are “kindling” and the third ones, the big ones are “fuel”.

So where is this going, mama? And she told me.

If you think of your morning wake-up as containing three perfect twigs to start the day’s happenings, these are what they would be:

1. Smile, because if you smile even when you feel lousy, your body changes physically and it will often just come along with your upturned lips.

2. Wake up with a project in mind.  Anything.  Breakfast, a painting, something interesting at your job, whatever, just something to DO.

3. Eat healthy foods and drink a lot of water every day and remember moderation in all things.

So I said, okay, mama, I can start the day with those three twigs, but hey, I’m going to apply this to kittydom and here are mine:

1. Stretch
2. Project yourself onto mama somehow so that she’ll feed you your Purina gelee.
3. Do a meticulous toilette so that you will be ready and able to confront life’s challenges, namely, where to snooze.

So we all have our ways of waking up.  As for mama’s third “twig”, I think you really have to add after “foods”, “such as dark chocolate”, and I think we’ve nailed it.

THIS IS NOT CHOCOLATE PUDDING!!!

*****

Au revoir, Jack, the cutest little rat we have ever known.  So sorry for your family’s sadness.