Waiting for the Sun

Waiting for the sun. For me, the rising sun is a precious moment each day that pulls me in close to my faith. It is a time for me and God, and my orange cat, to share.

Every morning, our little orange cat eagerly dances about me as I stumble to the kitchen in the predawn quiet in order to find caffeine and convince my eyes to focus. He urges me, in cat-like fashion, to open all the curtains as quickly as I can and then he races from one end of the house to the other, across furniture and bouncing on the sleeping dog as I celebrates the moments. Our little orange cat seems to be the only one in our house these days who delights in morning time. And the reason is that morning brings the sun in all its glory.

When you think about it, having a warming life-sustaining light appear each day in the sky really is a miracle. I am fully aware of the astronomy and physics that explains the phenomenon, but as Richard Feynman so often pointed out – we may have ideas and theories for the workings of the world around us, but we do not know why. We don’t know why, for example, the ball falls when we let go of it. All we know is that it will fall and we have developed math and physics, and those logical frameworks help us predict and quantify the event. But we don’t understand why. And we cannot, unless we are the ones who cause it. We are nothing more than bystanders when it comes to balls dropping and the sun rising and that is why I think it is justified to consider them part of the immense pile of daily miracles we are witness to. But the rising sun is the most special to me, and my little orange cat.

When the sun begins to peek out, our little orange cat heads for the top of the window to await it’s rising glory. First the sunlight hits his ears as he strains his neck to reach up to the light. Then a few minutes later, his entire head is bathed in the beautiful morning sun. I can see his whole body begin to relax and slump ever so slightly as he perches in the upper window and happily gazes about at the world outside.

Our cat and I are kindred spirits. I love the morning precisely because it is a chance to see the sun rise anew. When I am feeling frustrated with the previous day, when homeschooling is a slog or a child is sick, the rising sun feels to me like my own personal message from God to give me hope and joy.

And that is why every morning my little orange cat and I wait for the sun to rise, together.