Git Along Lil Kitties

I've always thought the term 'herding cats' was funny.

(Source: Google Images)

 

I think I find it amusing because as person who has had a lot of cats over the years I know how silly that idea is. I love this commercial for that reason.

Someone should tell our dog, Sadie, she'll never be successful at herding cats.

As part Australian Cattle Dog, Sadie's instincts are to herd just about everything. She's giving it a real effort with the cats but I'm afraid it isn't working. Sadly, it's a little like watching our country's leadership (a term I am using very loosely!) at the moment.

Actually, that isn't true. My animals are doing a better job of negotiating than our elected officials.

Although none of the cats seem to appreciate Sadie's attempts to herd them in a certain direction, most are willing to find a way to coexist peacefully, if not in full agreement. The only one not on board is elderly, grey, grumpy, and largely impotent. Which makes him sound a lot like a Republican Senator, come to think of it.

Regardless, the negotiations are ongoing. Every day brings a new opportunity to figure out how to give and take a little bit. Sadie doesn't really want the cats to eat from her food dish. But, she's willing to share some with them if it makes things better overall. And the cats don't absolutely love it when she tries to sniff their backsides, but if she goes about it calmly they seem to understand it as a gesture of diplomatic understanding.

So far nobody has gotten mean or aggressive or ugly. Nobody has put a stop to our household in demand of their own way. In all, I've watched my pets behave in a civil and respectful way. Which is more than I can say for our federal government.

Granted, out national issues are more significant than species cohabitation. But really now. You'd think if a houseful of animals can do it, our elected officials could too.

Remembering My Father

This week marked the 40th anniversary of my father's death. Forty years. That's such a long time.

The anniversary of his death doesn't hold any real sadness for me anymore. His death story is just another part of my life story. He's been gone for much more than half my life now. Still, I choose to remember and mark the day he died. For many years I did feel sad. And angry. And abandoned. But time has passed and I've come to terms with his decision to end his own life.

For so many years it seemed that my father's suicide was the only thing any of us really remembered about him. But with time and healing I've realized that his death didn't define him. Nor did his addictions. At his core, he was a good person. He suffered from mental illness and addiction at a time when our culture knew even less about how to deal with those issues than we do now.

I don't claim to understand what he did. I only know I've come to terms with it. He missed so much by opting out early. Most of my significant life events have occurred without him. My husband and children never got to know him. He wasn't present for any of my graduation ceremonies. He never got to see the woman I've become. I like to think he'd be proud.

These days memories of my father come in snippets. Moments in time sparked by one thing or another. The man I see in photographs reminds me of the man he was, although my own memory banks are fairly sparse. Because of the circumstances of his death, for many years I looked for him in a crowd. Although I knew he was dead, my soul longed to see him one more time; to say goodbye. It was unfair of him to say goodbye to me without giving me the chance to do the same. But then there are a lot of things about suicide that are unfair.

The day my father died, he dropped me off at school and before I got out of the car he said he loved me. He didn't say that often so I thought it was odd, but in retrospect I realize he was saying goodbye. He had carefully planned what he was going to do once he got home. I've grown to appreciate his last words to me. And I've grown to believe them. I didn't always.

A few years ago I was given a precious gift in saying goodbye to a friend's father the day before he died. Although he was drifting in and out of lucidity, at the moment of our goodbye he held my hand strongly, spoke clearly, and was immensely present. His words were soothing. He wasn't my father but he allowed me to exchange the words my father and I might have said had things been different. My soul calmed after that experience. I never looked for my father in a crowd again. I'd said goodbye.

Forgiveness came in stages. Through reoccurring dreams, my own maturity, and greater understanding of my father's addled mental state, I've come to forgive his actions. I wish he'd gotten help. I wish he'd made different choices. But I forgive the pain he caused. I don't believe he meant to hurt us.

My father is so much more than his death, though. I look at photographs of him as a baby, a teenager, and a young man and realize that he had a full and happy life before the agony of mental illness and addiction overtook him. He was a talented musician. He loved to celebrate everything. He was charming and engaging and in early photos there is a sparkle of joy. I see glimpses of him in myself and my children, and in my siblings, niece and nephews. His DNA is a part of us. Who he was before his tragic demise influences each of us in some small way.

Jimmy Charles Martin

Something went wrong in my father's life. When and how, I don't know. But something took his life long before he did.

I wish things had been different for him. I wish he'd been able to get help. I wish he'd known that his life was worth living. I wish he had lived a long, full life. I wish he'd known that he mattered.

Because, in this world, everyone matters.

Sadie and the Flood

In the middle of a massive flood, the likes of which this part of the country hasn't seen for at least 100 years, we, the card carrying cat people, adopted a dog.

Prior to a few days ago we never considered owning a dog. We've had all manner of cats but never has adopting a dog entered the picture. Not even once. But then Colorado started flooding and the world seemed insane and we did what any deeply committed cat people would do. We adopted a poor little homeless dog.

Meet Sadie

 

Sadie is young, just a puppy really, but her short life has been pretty challenging. She's already had a litter of her own puppies, learned a new language, been abused, and spent most of her life in a shelter. Sadie was on death row in New Mexico but granted a stay of execution by a benevolent woman who runs a no-kill rescue in Colorado.

Logic would say she is a flood refugee. Why else would non-dog people adopt her? But, logic doesn't have anything to do with this story. Nothing about the flood threatened Sadie's well-being. Yet everything about the flood prompted us to take her in.

The day the flooding started, I awoke to an alert on my phone. It said: Flood Alert only I didn't have my glasses on so I thought is said: Food Alert and hoped there wasn't a salmonella outbreak involving the strawberries I had just eaten the day before. It took a while before I realized that there was an increasingly serious situation brewing in Boulder and Parker was trapped in the middle of it.

I was able to keep in touch with Parker by cell phone through the days of flooding. I knew that he and his roommates were doing everything they could to keep water from filling the house they are renting. They had stored provisions on the roof in the event they were forced to escape and await rescue but none of this prevented me from worrying. Parker kept things light and funny. He didn't tell me some of the more harrowing tales like the fact he was driving down the street when the flash flooding started and was literally seconds away from having his car swept away in the river of rushing water. Even though I didn't know that until later, I couldn't help but feel concern for his safety.

For three days I watched the news and cried. Worried for my son and seeing the massive destruction, loss of property, and death, I felt sad and, like everyone, helpless to do anything but watch as the bewildering scenes worsened.  Entire towns were underwater. Parking lots turned into lakes.  Local roads became raging rivers. A young man caught a carp in a street typically reserved for cars.

It was much too surreal.

Nothing about the situation made me think, "we should get a dog!" But in the midst of all the mayhem we met Sadie, heard her sad story, and impulsively decided to let her come and live with us. I don't claim the two events connect clearly but I do have a theory.

When the flooding started we had no idea how bad things would get. Our home sits high enough up that we felt relatively safe but as we watched the news we saw familiar places ravaged by rising and rushing water. We could do the usual and immensely valuable things such as pray, make financial donations, and give blood. But there was little more we could offer.

I think when we met Sadie and heard her story, it felt like we could make her poor sad dog life better. It was something we could do.  Granted, it wouldn't help the people who had lost their homes and family members. It wouldn't make any difference in the clean up process or any aspect of the recovery.

It was simply giving a dog a second chance.

Yet it felt right. It felt like we were making a difference, in whatever small way, toward goodness in the midst of so much that was bad.

I know it sounds a little crazy. It is.

Had we consulted our cats they would certainly have thought we were losing it. And I'm pretty sure they would have advised against adopting a dog. She's here though. They are getting used to the idea. They may not love having Sadie around but they are adjusting.

As for Miss Sadie, she knows nothing of the flood. She's oblivious to the sorrow and destruction around us and she is learning to tolerate a house full of cats. At this point all Sadie knows is that she's loved and fed and walked.

And for the first time in her life, she's home.

.

Miley Dearest

True confession: I got a little drawn into all the hysteria about Miley Cyrus's VMA performance. I couldn't resist clicking on the 'Watch it Here' link embedded in a voyeuristically detailed Internet article and saw, with my own eyes, all the wriggling and writhing and foam finger action.

It disturbed me.

But maybe not for the reasons it bothered many people. I found myself feeling a little distressed by Miley's performance because I kept thinking that's probably how my mother behaves in her retirement community. Hannah Montana gone bad.

Minus the teddy bear onesie.

 

(Source: Google Images)

 

Mommie Dearest's early dementia seems to be taking her further and further down the path of silly party girl. Not that I think this is unfamiliar territory for her, but she is slightly obsessed with drinking and boys. Well, no. She's completely obsessed. Granted, the boys are hauling around portable oxygen tanks, but if they fall into the category of male, my mother is plotting a way to go in for the kill.

Without her walker, Mommie Dearest is barely mobile. But with her walker, that girl can move. And if the right man comes along, she's all about catching him. Right basically means alive. The ability to hear is apparently optional.

Every week the residents in my mother's retirement community have 'Happy Hour.' Some of the residents don't seem so happy about it but for my mother this is a highlight event. Not only do they serve the finest quality boxed wine, but she has found a way to beat the two-Styrofoam-cup limit, thereby consuming as much wine as she can finagle in an hour. She does this by shamelessly flirting with the male residents; cooing, and smiling, and doing some weird coy thing until she talks them into delivering a cup of wine. They comply, although it isn't exactly on a silver platter. Usually the delivery is rolled to her on the seat of a walker.

You'd think two brimming Styrofoam cups of wine in one hour would be plenty. I'd think that too. Mommie Dearest does not. It is all about the conquer. All about not letting someone tell her what to do. The more cups of wine she has brought to her the more she feels she's won. She does not, however, talk any of the female residents into her deceptive little game. Unimpressed by her girlish act, the women tell her to get her own wine. But she manages to talk the men into it. Every time.

In addition to drinking the most wine, my mother boasts of having the most 'boyfriends.' No single man with teeth is safe from her womanly wiles. At 'Happy Hour' last week, I met her latest victim, Ralph. It went like this:

MD:  Ralph, I want you to meet my daughter, Karen.

Ralph: (Shaking my hand) Nice to meet you, Karen.

Me: (Shaking back) Actually, my name is Sue.

Ralph: (Still shaking) Nice to meet you, June.

MD: Oh! You're Susan! Ralph, I want you to meet my daughter, Susan.

Ralph: (Still shaking) Nice to meet you, Susan.

Ralph: (Looking at my mother with a confused expression)

At that point it just wasn't worth clarifying that nobody in our family is named June, my sister is named Karen, and I actually am Susan, although nobody really calls me that unless I'm in trouble. Which, apparently I was. Probably for impersonating other people.

Ralph wouldn't have heard me anyway.

I didn't attend 'Happy Hour' with her this week. I can only take so much of her wild child act before I need a break. It doesn't matter. She's doing her thing regardless of whether I'm there.

But really, I guess all of this is fairly harmless. I mean, she's 85-years old. If it makes her happy, why not? At least I haven't seen her twerking.

Yet.

My Two Brains

My favorite color is fuchsia. Except sometimes it is red. And I love the independent spirit of cats. Only, I enjoy the eager friendliness of dogs too. I truly value the benefits of a healthy diet. But my favorite food is cookies made with real butter, white flour, and sugar.

F. Scott Fitzgerald is credited with saying, "The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function." Presumably he said this during a bout of sobriety, but it is a powerful and meaningful quote regardless of his state of mind when he wrote it.

I'm not entirely sure it is a test of first-rate intelligence. Maybe it is just a test of being human. Regardless, I've been holding two very opposed ideas in my mind a lot lately. Each with a great deal of intensity. We will be leaving Anna at college for the first time tomorrow. This makes me feel both happy and sad.

On the one hand, I've looked forward to this day for years. She's always been highly motivated and smart and talented. I knew one day she'd leave for college because it was the only natural outcome of who she has been up until now. She has worked hard for this opportunity and I'm immensely proud of her.

 

On the other hand, I've dreaded this day for years. She's my baby girl and we've had an unusually close relationship throughout her whole life. I can't imagine what life will be like not seeing and hugging her everyday. It leaves me feeling a little desperate.

Part of me is so excited for what she will learn and experience, the way she will grow, and the opportunities in front of her, that I can hardly contain myself. The other part wants to curl into a fetal position and cry for knowing I'll miss her company so much it will hurt. At least she could have chosen a college in the same state.

I've been Googling strategies for containing tears so I'm not that mother while we are moving her in to her residence hall and saying goodbye. One suggestion was to pinch the skin between my thumb and forefinger hard to keep myself from crying. The assumption being that physical pain will be a distraction from emotional pain. I might try it. I also might leave with a bruised hand and still have a tear streaked face. Something tells me I'm not going to be the be the only mother who cries anyway. I'll try to be strong. I'll do my best not to grab her by the ankles and sob. I make no guarantees though. 

I remind myself, daily, that we will really only be a phone call away. I've marked the calendar with her breaks and scheduled trips home. I also remind myself that I've known this day was coming since the moment she was born. In fact I've worked with her and for her so this day could come.

Nevertheless, it would have been nice if someone would have mentioned how this would feel before I started having babies. That full disclosure thing seems to be missing from the parenting contract. In a lot of ways.

Anyway, it is here now. The day my baby girl starts learning to live her life apart from me. She's ready. Even if I'm not sure I am.

Tomorrow I'll have moments when I'll feel I couldn't be happier.

And moments when I'll feel I couldn't be sadder.

But through it all I will still retain my ability to function.

I think.









 

Blue Lips and Pink Gloss

I love hiking 14ers.

Okay, that isn't really true. I love having hiked 14ers. Hiking and having hiked are two different experiences. I can think of a number of things in life that feel that way; a heck of a lot of work to finish but once accomplished, well worth the effort.

Last week Anna and I hiked to the top of Mt. Evans with our hiking buddies, Tambra, Kristine, Jackie, and their ever cheerful dog, Ginger. As I took a rest (somewhere in the middle of a gigantic pile of large rocks) and looked up toward a 14,265 foot peak I couldn't even see, I didn't love it so much. In fact, I uttered some choice expletives and asked myself what I had been thinking.

Before every hike I wonder if this is the time I'll be too old, too fat, and too out of shape to reach the top. But then, eventually I do reach the top and the feeling is very different from the feelings I have looking up at a boulder hill with no discernible path except for the placement of a few cairns stacked creatively by helpful souls who sort of forged the way before us. At the top of the 14er the views are amazing and beautiful and majestic. At the top it feels like I can see forever. At the top it feels like I've done something special.

Of course a lot of people hike 14ers. At least a lot of people hike the 'easy' ones like I do. The ones that require walking and climbing but not dangling from ropes or scaling rock walls a'la Spiderman. Those dangling ones are better left to more athletic types. The non-technical hikes are plenty for me. And, seemingly, for many others I meet along the way.

I've noticed hiking people are a friendly bunch. They encourage and support one another in ways I like to hope they display when they aren't hiking up the side of a mountain. 

Once we met one group of hikers who carried a bottle of champagne and some Dixie cups to the top of an over 14,000 foot peak so they could celebrate a woman in their party who had conquered cancer. They offered to include us and the other hikers at the summit in their toast. I chose not to imbibe since considerable exertion and little oxygen were already making me a bit loopy. I cheered for her though. Their party started the hike long before we did and although we are slow hikers, they finished long after we did. It was a powerful and poignant ceremony as they raised their paper cups, cried, and hugged their victorious friend. Nobody watching that could have felt anything but joy for that woman and her companions. Nobody with a heart, anyway. Hikers all around admired her spirit.

Often hikers who are headed down the mountain stop and high-five hikers who are headed up the mountain, offering words of encouragement and estimates about the distance to the summit. I've seen total strangers offer food to others who hadn't brought enough. I've witnessed slower hikers graciously move aside to make room for faster hikers. In all, everyone wants to see everyone else succeed.

There are lessons about life in there somewhere.

Last week as Tambra and I made our slow but steady progress up the mountain we met up with a couple of other women who were hiking together. One was more experienced. The other was hiking her first 14er and struggling quite a bit. Periodically the struggler would stop to take a hit off her partner's oxygen canister while her partner applied pink lip gloss. I've never seen a hiker use an oxygen canister. But then I've never seen a hiker apply lip gloss in the middle of a boulder field either. Perhaps she just wanted to look pretty when she reached the summit. I'm not sure. I considered suggesting that she offer her lip gloss to her friend who was sucking oxygen from a can because at one point when I stopped to breathe and take in the view behind me I noticed the oxygen sucker's lips were blue. For a split second I was about to exclaim, "Oh my...your lips are blue!" but decided better of it. She seemed to be having a hard enough time without being told she looked a little dead. So instead, I pointed out the beautiful view from where we were standing, tried to take her mind off the nausea she said she was feeling, and offered her a Vitamin B capsule.

Lady Blue Lips eventually made it to the summit alongside Lady Pink Lips and I was happy to see that she had succeeded. There is something significant about completing an endeavor that seems insurmountable at points along the way. The first time I hiked at 14,000 peak  I was in the midst of completing my doctoral program. I wrote a blog post about how the hike felt analogous to the daunting work of writing a dissertation.

It is good to succeed and make it to the top. But it is good to see others do the same thing,too.

To say I love hiking 14ers isn't really true. I don't. It is strenuous and painful and at times a little scary. But along the way I've met people who were kind, gracious, caring, giving, encouraging...and now I've met one who even had glossy lips. At the top of a 14er the air is fresh, the views are spectacular, the sky is gorgeous, and the people are good. There are important lessons to learn along the way.

I don't love hiking a 14er. I do, however, love having hiked one.

Shopping and Smooching

Mommie Dearest turned 85 years-old last week. It was an accomplishment worth celebrating. I mean, for a woman who has had cancer, a bunch of joints replaced, almost every non-vital organ removed, and an entire summer of near death experiences, getting to 85 is a pretty big deal.

Her circle of friends just sort of shrugged though. Eight-five, schmaety-five. She's relatively young compared to the people she lives with.  But to her it felt like a milestone. 

Every month her retirement community throws a fancy birthday dinner which she invited me to attend. I could have gone, but the idea was challenging to say the least. I understand that if I've inherited her genes of longevity I may live and eat among older people one day. For right now, though, I have a bit of trouble eating mushy, tasteless food in a setting that, while decorated in lovely, homey fashion, largely consists of smells and sights that do little to provoke a hearty appetite. 

Not entirely altruistically, I suggested taking her out to lunch instead. She happily accepted my invitation since she enjoys getting away from her retirement home and out in the 'real world.' Anna and I took her to Red Robin, not because of the elegant, fine dining, but because I knew she'd get a free ice-cream sundae, the staff would sing to her, and Parker would be her waiter. All those things would make her happy.

Mommie Dearest isn't a big eater but she found a cup of French onion soup on the menu and that struck her fancy. She ordered an obligatory side salad also. She was able to finish the soup but after a bite or two of salad declared herself far too full to finish. Of course this meant she had to have a 'to-go' box as she couldn't just leave it. What this really means is that the next time I'm at her apartment I'll toss the salad in the trash after it has become fuzzy and colorful.

Not surprisingly though, when her ice cream sundae arrived she smiled coyly through the birthday song and then dug in. Without offering to share a single bite, she finished the entire dish and never missed a beat.

"Never eat more than you can lift." Miss Piggy

Parker suggested that for her 86th birthday, they do keg stands together. She has no idea what a keg stand is (I admit I'm not entirely sure either) even after he explained it to her. She said she wasn't sure how well she could do one...but she was pretty good at smooching. 

Because somehow those two things must relate.

Mommie Dearest may be 85 but I'm pretty sure she still thinks of herself like this.

 

Which can't be all bad, I guess.

Her two favorite things these days seem to be smooching and shopping. I don't really want to be around for either but the least painful seemed to be shopping. I offered to take her to Target after lunch. 

Her excitement was palpable as she boarded the ride-on cart and threatened the very lives of  shoppers throughout the entire store. A small boy and his father walked by and as she whizzed past them I very seriously told the boy to run for his life. Somehow the fact that I was joking escaped them and they both looked at me as though I was the crazy one. We never saw them again. I suspect dad whisked the child off to safer establishments.

Mommie Dearest immediately made a beeline for the clothing department where she scoured the sale racks. At one point she said, "Look, jeans are 50% off!"  I reminded her she doesn't wear jeans.

Details.

By the time we finished the shopping trip, Anna had started to look like a jonesing drug addict and I was thinking of deliberately walking in front of the moving electric cart. 

My mother, however, was nothing short of ecstatic. True, I hadn't found her a smooching partner but I had provided her with the joy of finding sale items to enhance her appearance while she man hunts. 

In fact, Mommie Dearest was so happy she forgot to mention how bad my hair looked or how much weight she thinks I've gained. 

I guess if it brings her that much joy I can take her again. 

For her next 85th birthday.