Free Chicken Soup for the Cat & Dog Lover's Soul by Jack Canfield

sternly. She was not going to make any concessions. “Other arrangements will have to be made. For all the cats.”
    Sister Seraphim’s round face grew troubled. She knew she had to obey Mother’s instructions, but what would happen to her cats?
    Over the next few weeks, after much worry and many phone calls and visits to local families, Sister Seraphim managed to find homes for all the cats. She vowed to start afresh with a slate clean of animals and an uncomplicated life. But it wasn’t long before a couple of stray cats appeared, obviously in need of her help. Sister Seraphim fed them. What else could she do? And of course it wasn’t long before word spread along the feline grapevine, and more unwanted cats sought succor from the angelic sister.
    Mother Superior appeared to turn a blind eye at first, but inevitably, the day came when “other arrangements” had to be made.
    And so the years passed. As she grew older, Sister Seraphim began to suffer from respiratory problems and arthritis. The time came when her order arranged for her to move to Arizona, hoping that the dry climate might improve her health.
    Of course, Sister Seraphim’s compassion for homeless cats didn’t lessen at all in her new location. Shortly after arriving in Tucson, she decided to take matters into her own hands. The elderly nun persuaded a local real estate agent to donate a house and land. And there she founded the Hermitage, a no-kill cat shelter. At the Hermitage, Sister Seraphim and her cats found a refuge where, for the rest of her days, she no longer had to make “other arrangements.”
    And when Sister Seraphim finally met God, they had both kept their end of the bargain.
    Jane Eppinga

Heart of a Champion
    Though it’s been years since his racing career ended, Niatross is still a powerful horse. Taller than most men, he weighs half a ton, with a broad chest and chiseled muscles that ripple under a rich bronze coat.
    A racing legend, the champion Standardbred racehorse won thirty-seven of thirty-nine races in 1979–80 and over a million dollars. No horse could pass him once he got the lead.
    In 1996, when he was nineteen years old, Niatross made a twenty-city tour across North America. For sixteen years, Niatross had done little more than romp in his paddock and munch hay and oats. Now he’d have a rock star’s schedule, with press conferences and photographers in every city, a strange stall to sleep in and thousands of fans wanting to pet and fuss over him. As his tour manager, I traveled with him.
    Niatross greeted fans from Maine to Illinois, in big cities and county fairs, in scorching heat and chilly winds. Niatross endured it all with grace and almost eerie intelligence. He was always able to sense what was expected of him and do it.
    One night in Buffalo, New York, Niatross pawed and stomped his feet as he waited for his cue to pace down the racetrack for a photo session. The big horse, in his impatience, reared up on his hind legs, pulling his handler (a six-foot, six-inch man) off his feet, before lunging on to the track. But the outburst was over quickly and soon he stood to be photographed, once again the obliging star.
    After his track appearance, Chris, his handler, unharnessed Niatross and brushed his lustrous coat. As the two rounded the corner from the barn to the grandstand where a crowd of fans waited, Niatross rolled his eyes and stopped in his tracks, as if to say, “Oh, no. I have to do this again?” But with a gentle tug on the lead rope, Niatross moved ahead to take his place of honor.
    For two hours, he was petted, stroked, prodded and swooned over. I was silently thanking Niatross for another night of patience with us when out of the corner of my eye, I saw a moving, buzzing blur zipping across the pavement toward Niatross. As it drew closer, I could see that the blur was a child in an electric wheelchair. The child had his chair going full throttle and before I could caution him not to scare Niatross,