BUNNY

I have a friend whom everyone calls “Bunny”. It’s not because he looks like a lost little rabbit (although sometimes there are resemblances), not because he is light on his feet (although in his long-past prime he was), and not because he is so cute and cuddly (although certain women I know think he is). No Bunny is called Bunny, I think, simply because the name doesn’t fit.

Let’s face it, can you see an All-State linebacker called “Bunny”? Can you imagine a hardnosed miner or steelworker called “Bunny”? Can you even believe a grown man called by that name? It just doesn’t fit, does it? And yet “Bunny” fits Bunny perfectly.

“Why?” you ask. “Bunny” fits Bunny perfectly because “Bunny” doesn’t fit: you never know when he is serious or when he is pulling your leg, when he is telling the truth or feeding you carrots.

Now this behavior might be disconcerting to some of us who just don’t like our legs being pulled. Some of us want a spade to be called a spade and not a shovel, if you know what I mean. Some of us just hate to be played the fool even in jest.

But people like Bunny are there to remind us that life, serious as it is, isn’t all that serious. Life is to be lived, loved and thoroughly enjoyed. One cannot be so straight-laced that any deviation is looked upon as out of the ordinary. The ordinary in life is often to expect the unexpected and not to always expect the expected.

That is why Bunny is so refreshing. I have learned, as the women I mentioned above have not, to expect the unexpected from Bunny. That includes a tear in his eye when he is telling me about how his Beloved lit a cigarette for him while he was flat on his back – and you know how she hates him to smoke. The unexpected also includes his total devotion to his children and all children, something that is rare these days when “Me First” often seems the pervading philosophy of life. The unexpected is being there when anyone needs him. Another rarity.

I write this not to give Bunny and the Bunnys of this world swelled heads. I write it to remind me, to remind all of us, that part of what makes Bunny Bunny is also part of us: the ready smile, the unpredictability, the joy of living, even when life seems unfair.

Sometimes we forget that life, our life, was given to us to be enjoyed, not just endured; to be lived out, not just languished through; to be celebrated, not just completed. Bunny enjoys, lives, celebrates life, every day of it. So should we.

Into every life a Bunny needs to come: to pick us up when we are down; to make us smile amid our tears; to hold our hand when we are weak; to ease our pain when we hurt so badly. We need to find our Bunny and we need to be a Bunny one to another.