Summer of 1960 When I Was 7... chapter 6.... Happy Bunny

 Summer of 1960 When I Was 7...Chapter 6.....  Happy Bunny, we love you.                  

One day early in the summer our mother brought home a rabbit. Anytime something seemed like a present, Patty would sing happy birthday and call it happy.  So the name stuck and the rabbit’s name was Happy.  She was a pretty, white rabbit with large pink eyes.  Her ears stuck straight up and her nose never stopped moving.

  Momma said, “She’s pregnant and is going to have babies.  Now don’t get too attached because we’re going to sell the babies when they get old enough.”

Momma went out to the back yard and worked hard at making a cage.  There was some old chicken wire and some pieces of wood left over from when Daddy made the pole barn.  Happy’s feet fell through the holes on the bottom of the cage.  But so did her poop, which were as round as little balls and made little mountains underneath the cage.  Happy spent most of her time in a little box on one end of her cage.  She pulled hair from her chest and made a soft, fuzzy bed.  We spent a lot of time in the back yard poking our fingers through the wire touching the white, velvet fur and telling Happy how much we loved her. 

         

               Little nudges happen in everyday life, seemingly innocuous things, but they can have profound life- changing repercussions.  Some of these everyday events can hold onto your heart so the mind can’t stop thinking about them.  And they change you…subtly…and forever.  The old saying, “people might not remember what you say or do but they’ll remember how you made them feel.”  is so true. 

One of my earliest memories was a woman wearing a white dress teaching me a song…

 

                                                           This Little Light of Mine,

                                                                            I’m gonna let it shine,

                                                                            This Little Light of Mine,

                                                                              I’m gonna let it shine,

                                                                         This Little Light of Mine,

                                                                             I’m gonna let it shine,

                                                                    Let it shine , Let it shine, Let it shine.

 

I was too young to remember the lady.  I just remember how she made me feel.  She held me in her lap and told me how special I was.  And she taught me my special little song. When I was little I would hold up one finger and sing about my light.   I always thought that song was mine.  Only mine.   I sang it all the time.  Then as I got a little older I was taught stories about heaven and angels.  It stuck in my mind that the lady in white just might have been an angel.  All I knew is that I felt the love she had for me every time I sang my song. And any time I was lonely or had hurt feelings, I’d sit and sing my song to myself thinking about that angel lady.  

                                                                  to be continued....