That everyone may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all his toil; this is the gift of God. Ecclesiastes 3:13
My sister and I were stretching out lazily on our perspective lounge chairs listening to the peaceful sounds of late summer on the back patio of her Oregon home. It was dark and we watched the moon cast beautiful shadows on her nearby pond. The quiet and warmth were blissful and we sat enchanted...well at least I was enchanted. My sister was thinking suspiciously like a cowboy in an old western..."It's quiet", she slowly reflected, "in fact it was TOO quiet..." Suddenly she sat up abruptly and said with astonished realization, "I think my kids ate all my frogs!"
The frogs were normally plentiful in the pond and even her two chocolate labs and her alpha female-want-to-be-lab-Shih Tzu, had not depleted the quantity with their raucous romps in the water causing huge numbers of frogs to leap in all direction to escape the dogs' gleeful fun. Yet, here we were at night, next to a pond and we did not hear one single croak.
My sister's grown children had recently had a camp out with their children around the pond while she was away. They had text-ed her that they were having such a good time and were even going to cook some frog legs like they did when they were younger. My sister had smiled fondly at the text, remembering the fun frog giggling times their family had when the kids were small. However, her country kids had learned their gigging skills well and their aim was apparently true, because the uncharacteristic quietness of the pond did indeed suggest that her fears had substance...her kids had eaten all the frogs. I offered weakly, "Maybe they're just a little cautious about croaking right now..."
Now I remember my city-born kids eating all the cookies at one setting, and even a particularly stealthy and mysterious dessert thief in the family who always struck at night, but I never had to worry that they were out marauding the neighborhood depleting its frog supply after we went to bed. Therefore, when my sister strung those crazy-sounding astonished words together, I could do nothing but laugh...and at the same time feel a bit of sadness for the frogs.
I have a frog at my front door every day. Sometimes there are two or more lining up on top of a painting I hang from the porch light for the summer. The frogs have found that good eats are always around the porch light and are undoubtedly thankful when I place the painting back under the light, thus making their feasting all the more expedient.
Sometimes frogs cling to my small window near my front door in obvious effort to thank me for their bounty, jumping in to join us on occasion. Crane flies and moths are their usual diet, and before the frogs found their high-rise dining table, my porch floor was littered with the singed carcasses of these insects each morning. Now, instead of lifeless insects, my porch and the painting sport a much different look...frog poop.
It is amazing to me how large and abundantly a small frog can poop. Every few days I wash off my painting and sweep the poop from my porch, wondering if the trade-off from dead insects is worth it. Then I remember how those crane flies and moths attack my lawn, and I'm thankful for the help I receive from my frog family. "That everyone may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all his toil; this is the gift of God." May my niece and nephew and all our frogs find satisfaction in the toil of their work and be blessed.
