My dear friend, Lisa, sent me a gift this past Christmas. It was a plastic, motion-sensor cardinal with instructions that I could throw it away if it was too annoying.

Cardinals are near to my heart. For a year and a half, I was too ill to leave the house. Through the office window, I spent many mornings watching as a pair of cardinals sang beautiful duets with each other. Their colors were mesmerizing. For me, they became a symbol of hope to remember there was life outside the walls of my apartment.

As I grew stronger and began to leave the house, I no longer saw my two, favorite birds.

Glimpses of them are rare these days. From time to time, I hear their lovely songs cascading from the treetops. I like to imagine the cardinals are bringing hope to someone else.

Every once in a while, a sweet friend or family member will send me a cardinal knickknack as a reminder of how far I’ve come on this journey. I opened Lisa’s gift and excitedly pulled out the small strip of paper that was blocking the motion sensor.

The plastic cardinal began to sing, “Tweeeet. Tweet tweet. Tweet tweet. Twee-e-e-e-eet.”

“This really works,” I thought to myself as I perched the cardinal on the mantle.

Dog number one walked buy soma pills online past and the cardinal immediately began to sing.

Then, dog number two walked past and sure enough, it started to sing again. In fact, dog number two walked in front of the cardinal a few times, each time triggering the motion sensor.

Once again, the cardinal chirped when Hubby came close.

Realizing that the mantle was probably not the right place for this gift, I did what any sentimental gal would do with a hypersensitive, plastic, motion sensor cardinal:

I stuffed it in the sock drawer.

I couldn’t possibly toss it in the trash! I was very touched by Lisa’s thoughtful gesture.

Last night I had terrible insomnia from recently adding some medications to my treatment protocol. Frustrated by my inability to fall asleep, I got up to take the second half of my sleep meds. I fumbled around in the darkness until I had my pill container in one hand and a glass of water in the other. I took my sleep meds and set my glass on the dresser.

As I turned to crawl back into my bed, I heard a muffled sound coming from the top dresser drawer.

“Tweeeet. Tweet tweet. Tweet tweet. Twee-e-e-e-eet.”