Reality Trumps Perception ...

The famished mouse could hardly believe its good fortune ... discovering a gap in the shed's wooden sheathing large enough to crawl through, yet too narrow for the mangy cat perched high atop a nearby fencepost to enter ... inside the shed rested a mammoth, at least in the mouse's perspective, wheel of scrumptious cheese, which was unfortunately too large to squeeze through the space in the planks even if the puny Mus musculus had been stout enough to heft it ... so the ever-ravenous rodent decided it well-worth the risk to oft scurry as quickly as possible across the grounds from its nest beneath the well house, eat its fill then afterward make a hasty return ... upon each attempt the habitually vigilant genus Felis would pounce from his vantage point in pursuit of the mouse nearly grasping it each time in his sharp claws as it disappeared through the space in the shed ... for the next several days the cat continued to chase the mouse to and fro albeit unable to overtake it, so the cat concluded that an unconventional approach to the situation was necessary ... else he too would anon feel pangs of hunger along with the besmirchment of his longstanding reputation as an adept hunter.

For the next few days the cat simply sat there watching squint-eyed as the hungry mouse charged toward the shed then back again ... soon the mouse began to reckon the cat to be more reasonable than originally thought by obviously abandoning all efforts to apprehend it ... eventually the mouse developed a cavalier attitude and would confidently take its good ol' time leisurely strolling back and forth while paying little to no attention to the cat, often pausing midway to wiggle its whiskered nose while casting a wry glance in the apparently insouciant feline's direction ... one day after eating its fill, the abdominous mouse exited through the space in the shed on its way back to the well house again stopping midpoint to sardonically taunt its erstwhile nemesis, but the cat was conspicuously absent from his lofty roost ... fraught with sudden panic and fright the mouse tightly closed its beady eyes then sped toward the safety of its nest as fast as its feet could carry its rotund body ... believing that it had perhaps miraculously escaped unscathed to the entrance of its abode beneath the well house the mouse breathlessly opened its eyes just as it dove into the waiting mouth of the cat ... with a keen sense of self-fulfillment the cat again climbed atop the fencepost as he pondered amongst his infinite erudite thoughts how that reality trumps perception every time!

"I returned, and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favour to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all. For man also knoweth not his time: as the fishes that are taken in an evil net, and as the birds that are caught in the snare; so are the sons of men snared in an evil time, when it falleth suddenly upon them."   --Ecclesiastes 9:10-12


--sja