It was a rainy afternoon at de bridge. SaraFerret was asleep in her hammock surrounded by her various orphan kits and others of her family. Some were awake and others were drowsing in dere sleepsacks. Den dey heard a knock-knock at de cottage entrance. Isabel ran to de door (she's always de first to try to reach it) and opened it. Dexter, de little boy courier, peeked in and asked, Is SawaFewwet awound? Dere's a fewwet getting weady to cwoss de bwidge and allde other bwidge gweeters are away. (SaraFerret already had one eye open at de sound of the knock-knock--she knew what was going on as seldom are dere knock-knocks). Isabel replied, sure Mommy's always here (she still tinks I'm her Mommy). By this time, SaraFerret had both eyes open and was stretching. Dexter handed her de note and she read it and told Dexter, Quick, fly over to Fuzzy Loving Lane and get de other fuzzies so de can meet dis newcomer. So off he went in one way and off she went toward de bridge entrance. JUST IN TIME! Dere dis big sable blaze comes,just trotting across de bridge like he owned de place. He just comes rights up to me and introduces himself and says, Hi, I am Liberty's Freedom Spirit, furchild of Mommy Debi and for some reason I was with her one minute and now I am here and I don't understand why, except Mommy told me something about a place called the bridge and someone named SaraFerret. Since my name is so long how about just calling me Spirit. (Well that speech saves me lotsa time). I says, Yes I am SaraFerret de bridgegreeter and you are at de bridge. Welcome to your new forever home. Here you will have no pain or suffering, no litter pans, lots of green grass to run and plays, other ferrets to visit with. Did I mention fun and games? At that point, Spirit leans over and kisses my paw. (Now you can tell dat dis fuzzy was a flirt). Pleased to meet such a charming ferret; what a lovely bushy tail you have (never mentioning my rather sparse fur--such a tactful fuzzy). I was a V-Hob on earth, he says. But I guess now I won't has to has to be concern about that anymore. We laughed about that for a while and then he just had to show me his small backpack. He opened it and there in a small cloth bag were pieces of fur--he took each one out and lovingly caressed each one--this one belonged to this lady fuzzy and this one belonged to that one--each lady had given him a tiny bit of fur to remember her by so he would never forget her scent (and since ferrets unlike humans can take it with them on their eternal journey he had only those to bring with him and so he did). He noticed my wings and he admired those also and asked if he was gonna get some too. Oh for sure, I replied. Any special color, you like, Spirit? He just replied, Oh I am not fussy, you pick out a color, SaraFerret. So off we went to de Wing House. We opened de door and went in and dere on de counter was a big box (of course). Spirit opened de box and took out de wings--The FLASHIEST BLUE with soft blue streaks shot through dem--Wowsie! I had never seens dese kind befores. We got dem on him and I gots on a box to put his halo on him and he went over to the vanity mirror. He looked at his reflection with a smile. VANITY--THY NAME IS FERRET! Then he says I wish Mommy and Daddy could seen how pretty and fluffy I look now with my wings and halo. I look kinda bad when dey saw me last. I tries to reassure him dat dey love him in spites of how he looks, but... You know how us fuzzies are... just a bit vain about our looks. So I gots an idea. We went out de door. All of a sudden a group of fuzzies from Fuzzy Loving Lane rushed to greet him, saying, Hiya Spirit, how's Mommy and Daddy. Welcome to de bridge. Hey, come with us to de Otters' Mudslide! Dey were so overjoyed to see him and welcome him. Spirit was relieved to see the big welcome from de other fuzzies esp. de ladies who he had visited so often. But den he stopped and remembered someone: Mommy Debi. He turned to me and asked, is there anyway that I can see Mommy and Daddy once again? I said, Well, lets see. So off we went down de garden path. Finally we reached de misting pond. We all crouched down and I swished de water. Den Spirit saw Mommy Debi sighing big sighs and saying to her friends how much she missed her beloved fuzzy, Spirit and even a tear ran down her cheek when she says dat. He started waving and he noticed dat Mommy looked up as tho she could hear something and then look away again. Do you think she heard me? he asked me. Of course she did, didn't you see her look up? Den Spirit started throwing kisses and hugs and wrapped dem with love and laid dem on a nearby shooting star and by de time you read dis you will have received dem. Spirit made a promise dat maybe he would visit you in a dream and you would know by his musky scent or de feel of his scratchy whiskers dat he had been dere or even a daytime fleeting whispery visit would remind you of him. De all de others of de Fuzzy Loving Group cheered and waved to Mommy and threw a quick kiss. And with another swish, the vision was gone. Even though I was tired from all de greetings, I decided to go with de group. As we arrived at 45 Fuzzy Loving Lane, we saw a big banner dat says, WELCOME TO THE BRIDGE LIBERTYS FREEDOM SPIRIT. The mousie angels had prepared such a spread. Iced teas, cold pepsis, squirt cheese with crackers, cat food, chocolate (all dose tings we isn't spose to has on earth). Spirit was just in awe of de party. Well we wardanced and dooked and carryed on until de early hours when we just dropped on any sleepsack and hammie we could finds. I tink I fell asleep on top of three soft fuzzies, I was dat tired. So ended another day at de Rainbow Bridge. Loveys and hugs, SaraFerret, bridgegreeter [Posted in FML 5716]