A fable ...

I did my Clinical Pastoral Education at Sarasota Memorial Hospital in Florida. I have one full basic unit. As I reminisced about it with a friend this morning, I was reminded of an old story I heard there ... There once was a bird who was a little slow in getting started on his fall migration to the south. In fact, he waited so long that snow came. As he saw the snow begin, he decided to begin his journey to warmer weather. After a few hours of flying in flurries of snow, it became dark and snow grew fiercer and heavier. It was that thick slushy kind of snow blown into a blizzard. The little bird was having a difficult time making progress and grew exhausted. But he could find no good place to land. He continued onward using up every last bit of strength. Just as he thought he would give up and die in the snow, he saw a faint light way off in the distance. It gave him renewed hope and a spurt of energy. He flew with all his strength toward the light and as he came closer, he saw it was a barn. Sapped of his strength and frozen, he flew into the barn, landed on a beam and collapsed. He fell to the floor that was padded by hay. Just then a cow dropped a load onto him. And that was the last he remembered until waking up. As he awoke, he felt warm and glad to be alive. And after a few minutes of pondering his good fortune of having a cow poop on him, he began to feel his pile shake. Something was digging him out. "Excellent!" he thought to himself, "First the cow saves me, now someone is setting me free!" But it was a cat. The cat dug him out and immediately ate the bird. The moral of the story: "Those that sh*t on you are not always your enemies and those that dig you out are not always your friends."