When the Crumpet Hits the Fan

Posted on by
27

What to do, what to do? Oh, how shall I ever master the art of propriety in prim company? How could I possibly survive tea with the Queen unscathed? A party with the pope?

photo

What a to-do!

I am gravely impaired when it comes to knowing the correct fork to use for each course, and even worse at knowing what to say among polite folk when moments of acute stress arise. Sadly, the first phrases that come to mind tend to be blurted out with a certain Anglo-Saxon bluntness at best, and I’ve not yet met any such bell that could be un-rung. I sigh.

photo

Is it possible to evade the blades?

There’s nothing more frustrating than trying to Be Myself without descending into silliness and horrendously incorrect Be-havior when I think the stakes are high. Need to impress the boss, make points with a priest, or conquer the king? I’m a lost little sheep. Yes, sheepish I can do. But I do crave approval enough that sometimes I’d really love to be able to gloss over that talent of mine for being a goofball and the unintentional class clown and show a bit more couth and culture, now, wouldn’t I.

photo

Looking foolish, yes, I can do that quite well, but maybe it's just not my cup of tea!

Etiquette coaching? Charm school? Ah, yes, that could all be useful. A kick in the trousers, oh, certainly. A severe talking-to by the headmistress, a careful and thorough study of the Encyclopedia of How to be Apropos, and perhaps a stint in niceness boot camp? Surely all fine and superb ideas and likely to make some improvements in my movements, so to speak. That’s all well and good, but it’s still not going to cure my natural awkwardness and inclination to curl up in a little pill-bug defense pose when faced with imperfection at the exact moment when I wanted to pose as little-miss-perfect. What!!

digitally doctored photo

I believe it's time to get the spinning to stop.

As it happens, I suspect the solution is pretty simple, after all. First step: how about getting over the idea that I can or should be perfect? Hmmm, I think maybe I could do that. I don’t doubt it’d be a healthy approach. Then there’s the useful thought of getting over the whole idea that I can or should convince others that I’m perfect. Aha. A very useful thing to do. What are they going to do, disown me? Refuse to be in the same room? Ha! Crotchety critics and conditional friends? Those are people I don’t want or need in my life! Good for me, if they don’t want to be in it in the first place.

Funny, but when I get thinking straight on the whole topic, it’s not I but rather the focal point that shifts. I realize that what worries me is not whether I can be perfect, not how to be perfect, certainly not how to convince anyone else I’m perfect–especially when I’ve already responded to my frequent-flyer-faux-pas by blurting out the perfectly outlandish verbal proof that reality is so otherwise. It’s more important to me, after all, to let go of all those improbable if not impossible perfectionist worries and know that being my ordinary, fallible, perfectly acceptable plain old self is a better prophylactic against embarrassment and rejection than any other, because it will help insure that I’m in the best company–for me. And I thank you all! [ . . . she cried out with a deep curtsey, tripping on the hem of her gown and cartwheeling down the grand staircase with that massive arrangement of stargazer lilies that she’d knocked over shooting out right over the top of her, and she, all the while, swearing in the most violent purple terms before finally coming to rest in a mangled and guffawing heap, upright and cross-legged, on the marble floor of the foyer, a chipped Limoges teacup improbably perched on top of her once-coiffed head . . . .]

Dude, You’re Harshing My Mellow

Posted on by
19

I was darning my husband’s sweater (they were only small holes, so not worthy of being damned) and in mid-stitch, was thinking that perhaps this is one of those many things that tells my age on me. As it is, I will readily admit to my advancing age–a thing of neutral value in my estimation, balancing fairly comfortably so far between worthwhile accumulations of experience and adventure and the brink of crepitation that will begin my final free-fall towards oblivion. So it’s not a touchy subject.photos x2What really struck me during this little bit of mending was that however cloddish my technique, it was still a very antique skill that I had learned from Mom in my youth and she, in her turn, from hers, and right on back into the impenetrable fog of history. Furthermore, a skill that you’d think a truly slothful person like I am at heart would find just a teeny bit repellant; you’d honestly expect something more like my flinging the sweater in a pile of give-away items as I slouched by on my way to the nearest chaise longue. I live in a disposable and spoiled society and it would be quite conceivable that I would far prefer to go with the flow of self-indulgence, lean back in the shade comfortably sipping sweet tea, and buy a new sweater with no untoward holes in it.

But along with that darning bit of old-fashioned fashion in me are a few other quirks of age. It’s clear that my multiple personalities are coming out of the woodwork in all of their glorious contradiction as I grow older. I am more able, for example, to recognize what would be the more mature thing to think, say or do in a given circumstance, but less willing to conform to that with every day that slithers by. I grow lazier–I would say by leaps and bounds, but that would imply energy being exerted to do so, obviously a misrepresentation, so let’s say by exponential expansion–that’s another thing, coincidentally, that I’m doing along with age, since I eat more and exercise less whenever I think I can get away with it. Even when I know I can’t. And yet another of these oddities is that while I grow lazier as quickly and surely as long blue-green hair grows on expiring vegetables, I also grow more stubborn about getting some things repaired in ways that will last longer and prevent my having to repair them next week yet once more. So I darn the darn things.

Everyone and everything else continues to age right along with me, so I feel safe in assuming a certain amount of knowing sympathy among my crinkled compadres, as well as understanding when I say that I am also simultaneously getting more profligate and more tight-fisted with my money. There are so many things that in days gone by I would have continently held in heart-thrumming abeyance as long as I could stand, both to see if I truly craved them enough for the sizable expenditure and because I thought it more fiscally prudent and Mature. Now, I’m often apt to shrug with a rich Gallic moue and say to myself, But Darling, you could, howcanIsayitdelicately, CROAK tomorrow! And POP! goes the wallet.

Some things I have learned actually do fall under the get-what-you-pay-for rubric, making up in the long term what they scared out of me in the present expense. Such, for example, is this cashmere sweater I mended. I am quite fond of bragging that I’ve bagged most of my non-shoe wardrobe for under USD $10, but on a couple of rare occasions I have seen one of a kind items either at surprise availability or better yet, on sale (perhaps resembling in this my brother-in-law, whose middle name we have occasionally joked should have been HalPris, or Half Price, for his amazing zest and gift for finding bargains)–when those moments come, it’s time to pony up and make the grand purchase. Because (a) high quality does last longer and (b) some outrageous things are just too jolly fun to have. So as I’m loath to cast off a slightly moth-eaten cashmere, it was worth the effort of the purchase enough that I’m willing to undergo the momentary exertion of actually mending and maintaining such a thing. It’s like a smaller and less complicated version of the relationship I have with a house: I know that things will constantly require attention and maintenance, and what falls within my limited skill range must be determined to be either worth the trouble or not, destined to be cheaply slicked over or staring me down with the necessity and value of genuine, if expensive, care and improvement.photoAs for the sweater with the holes in it, I just did the best I could making them disappear with some discreet back stitching and re-weaving of the threads. It deserved to be darned. The moth that munched the wool, him I did damn to perdition for his maleficence in undoing the pristineness of my husband’s only nice and slightly expensive sweater. Go back to your weed patch and chew on a rabid squirrel’s ankle or something, you mean MothMonster, why don’t you! And then I’d blow him away on a dandelion parachute, while lying back once again on my chaise as the sun drifts gradually down the afternoon sky.photo

Age Becomes Beauty

Posted on by
28

photos x2Ingrained

The salt and oil of his hand

are torment and life’s-blood both

to the volutes of the instrument

and to

the curving, sinuous surfaces of that

deep-burnished ancient bass—its sigh

at the mindful, guiding touch

of the hand

steady with certainty, knowing

the way from note to note,

from phrase to

singing phrase, without

reference anymore

to intent because

the thought, the meaning, the joy

and the intensity are all

as deep as heartwood in

the ancient tree that was

the bass’s former self.

Those days,

no bird

set in the boughs of the

grandfather tree

had sweeter voice

than the breezes piping softly

through its leaves, no, even than

the tiny song

humming through

the tree’s own heart, minute

and pale yet, sub-sonically, a hint

—a whisper—in

the lyric capillary rise

of tree’s-elixir every spring

of the string-bass sound

far-off, unborn,

lying cradled

until called out

by generations, ‘til,

goaded with salt,

soothed with oil,

called

to speak again as its

nature insists,

under a musician’s hand.

photos x3
Well Worn

There is a dignity

And elegance to being worn

Beyond recognition as

The thing-that-was:

Once pretty, fully functional,

Well designed—It’s by

The fineness of this apropos

Well-suitedness for use

That things that might

Have been quite simple and

Quite plain become

The hard-used favorites

That by this aging then

As Beautiful

Become defined


Favorite Boots

Hard to imagine how much wear

It takes to soften down

The tough old boots I loved the best

And burnish their deep brown

Thick skin until it’s almost black

In places by the heel

And worn by stirrups near the shank—

But I know how they feelphotos x2
The King is Sleeping

Don’t go in—the king is sleeping;

Don’t barge in, disturb his rest—

All the bodyguards were keeping

Such good care at his behest

Up until a couple decades

Turned to several centuries

And the stalwart guardians made

A heap of dust fine as the breeze

And the palace came to crumble

And the country to decay

And the sands of time to tumble

To eternity, away—

Let the king sleep on in silence;

There’s no reason to awake

Anymore, to stir and rile and

See destruction come and take

From him all his kingdom’s treasures,

All he held and fought to own,

All his onetime loves and pleasures

Turned to silicates and stone—

Don’t go in—the king is sleeping;

History cries ‘let him sleep!’

While the passing age is creeping,

Peace is all he gets to keep

Skipping thro’ the Birchen Wood, I Thought I Spied a Whale

Posted on by
26
acrylic on canvas

Here in the forests of my imagination . . .

What wondrous light through yonder branches gleams? Would that it were the opalescent glow of glimmering brilliance coming to infiltrate my idle brain. Or perhaps, an itinerant faerie spirit heading my way, jeweled sceptre alit with inspirational powers to be bestowed on my waiting brow with only the lightest of touches. Even the wan incandescent light that flickers in welcome warmth when someone stops by and drawls, ‘Whooooa, cool poem, dude!‘ is an apparition that I welcome in these woods.

But left to my own devices, I am often content to play hide-and-seek with the absurd and ridiculous denizens with whom I myself people the copses and clearings. It’s hard to be bored when in the world of my imaginings I might just as well see a party of rhinoceri dining daintily on macarons and sipping mimosas as find the standard woodland chirpy-birds and curly-tailed possums. And of course I can find plenty of entertainment in the latter, should my rare white rhino friends fail to materialize on the occasion.

The who-what-when-where-why approach of old-time journalism is hardly limited, but so often is put to service in creating dull worlds that have no scintillation or silver-lined possibility of their own. Why should I merely recount the facts, if my friends and compatriots have the same at their own fingertips or floating in the ether encircling their own fevered brows? I feel much more compelled, drawn (and quartered) by the fantastical and unreal, and that doesn’t mean that I must limit my contact with the quotidian. In my view, the real world and everyday experience are both bursting with nonsense and bizarre occurrences that would challenge the sanity of anyone willing to look just slightly under the surface, a tiny bit off of the center of the frame. It’s this singing netherworld of oddity and mystery, of hilarity and not-yet-discovered realms of the heart and mind, that pulls me into its mystical swirl and mesmerizes me.

I am astounded when I hear tell of people admonishing artists and creative folk to give up their wastrel ways and do something Productive. Where these same critics expect inventions or discoveries of import, let alone life-enhancing pleasures and spiritual inspirations, to emerge if not from creative work and play I am unable to guess.

I’ve long since left it to others to describe what they tout as Fact and confirmed Truth. There are endless phalanxes of politicians and scientists and religious leaders, hover-parents and bosses, dictators and dullards, all of whom readily offer their convictions of reality whether I ask them to or not, so I learned that I’d much rather stick to my own version of reality and just see where it takes me.

Does this approach expose me to ridicule and censure? Of course it does. Anything anyone else tells you ought to be taken with an entire inland sea of salt, if it keeps you from swallowing nonsense wholesale. I certainly don’t believe everything I say!

But I did learn, when I bundled up my outsized cravings for outside affirmation in the dense wrappings of uneasy reality and flung them all out the casement, that any reality is somewhat overrated. That the lilac scented porpoises leaping in my own candy-colored seas were not only good company but sometimes took me along to actual places of learning and wholesome connection with genuine people willing to dive into alternate worlds too. And that I grew more deeply convinced that nobody is in such dire need of the strictly factual that their lives can’t be enriched, like mine, by the meandering, iridescent, depthless, deathless joys of curiosity and invention and hope.

acrylic on canvas

. . . and away I swam, bathing in the limpid phosphorescence of wonderment . . .

Foodie Tuesday: Apple Pie Order

Posted on by
34

In most places, ‘apple pie order’ refers to perfect tidiness. Around me, not so. It has two meanings for me, each off on its own tangent. The first is very simple: it describes a standard action of my spouse’s–whenever the occasion should arise, he will order apple pie. The second meaning of the phrase in my world is quite the contrary to the idiom. When my husband’s menu request is at home, the pies I am apt to make are anything but orderly.photoAs with all of my kitchen adventures, the making of pie is always and only an approximation of reproducing a Platonic ideal of the pie concept. I am perhaps a touch the cantankerous and childish rebel in the kitchen, constitutionally unable to conform to others’ instructions to the letter. Can’t think of a lot of things as fun as playing with my food, after all. Remarkably, my supertaster spouse, with all of the palatal restrictions this condition inevitably entails, tolerates my machinations and monkeying remarkably well.

I use that phrase advisedly, since despite his uxorious generosity, he still doesn’t hesitate to remark on the results, good or bad. But he doesn’t actually turn up that fine-tuned nose of his very often, as it happens.

The mere physical assembly of a dish is unlikely to come very tidily from my hands, either, given my previously noted propensity for impatience. and slightly anarchic search for visual amusements. Needless to say, anything more pie- or tart-like than a mere crisp or crumble is more often than not going to turn out rustic as can be. Given that I’m a sort of rustic myself, I suppose it’s only fitting.

graphite and colored pencilThanksgiving‘s apple pie was somewhere in between true ‘apple pie order’ and my kind.

My mother is-was-and-ever-shall-be the indisputable nonpareil, the mistress and icon, of pie making. Her crust is legendary with very good reason. I’ve never met a filling she couldn’t make that wasn’t a paragon, the archetype of its genre. Her fresh raspberry pies, loaded with fruit of the canes she nurtured from cuttings off her father’s plants have been known to reduce adults of seemingly endless sophistication to slobbering infants in one bite, a whole slice to cause delirium, fainting spells, reenactments of the Dancing Plague of 1518, and umpteen return pilgrimages to the dessert table.

Needless to say, my pies grovel in obeisance to Mom‘s, though she’s much too modest and generous to require such a thing. So when she’s in our vicinity for any length of time, you can guess what she bakes for my elated husband. Last time, she went the extra mile and left a spare bottom crust and dough scraps in our freezer. So the Thanksgiving pie was even more reason for giving thanks: Mama’s magical piecrust, ready-made, waiting only to be filled for the big finish.

I blind-baked that bottom crust and a sheet of cinnamon-sugared leaves I’d cut out of the dough scraps, made apple pie filling, warmed all of the parts at the last and assembled the concoction just before serving time. The man with the spare tastebuds deemed the result a little too far inclined toward the nutmeg, and I agreed: I’m always a bit unclear on how much volatile oil is still present when I grate a nutmeg–guess this one was more potent than it smelled to me. But, miraculously, the pie still managed to disappear down various gullets with some alacrity. Not to mention with many spoonfuls of homemade vanilla-cinnamon ice cream.

photoThe filling was a little of this and a little of that, as usual. I always prefer a blend of tart and sweet apples, some firmer and some tenderer, so I chose a mix of Granny Smiths, Braeburns and Golden Delicious from among the grocer’s offerings. I cut them in somewhat varied thicknesses of slice and chunks both, because I like the textural variety it brings as well as the emphasis on the distinct tastes of the types. The rest is fairly standard stuff, mostly: sweetening, spices and flavorings, fat and thickener.

My favorite thickener for apple pie filling is a bit of quick-cooking (small grain) tapioca, which again contrasts in texture with the apples to liven things up a little, and keeps the pie from collapsing when sliced. Or almost does. For sweetening apple pies, I love to use brown sugar for part or all (as in this case), because it’s no secret caramel and apples are a divine pairing and that flavor comes through in a pie nicely. A dram of vanilla to smooth out the caramel flavor. A toss of salt. A little lime juice to spark the sweetness and keep the apples’ color. A good dose of browned butter to add a little nutty undertone. And a last boost of both sweetening and zing, a spoonful of ginger preserves.

That leaves the other pie spices, and I’m pretty sure I’m relatively tame and standard with my cinnamon, nutmeg and a dash of cloves and that little bit of sweet-spicy ginger, even if I did accidentally go a little overboard with the nutmeg this time around. After all, I’m not a monster. It is my husband who asked for apple pie. And he does like his in apple pie order.

Lowbrow Criminal Activity for Fun and Profit

Posted on by
20

I confess, I would make a terrible criminal. See that? I already confessed, and I hadn’t even done anything underhanded yet. My mother is the one we kids always said would be the ideal wicked-mastermind, because she’s so incredibly good and kind and nice, nobody would ever suspect her. Of course, there’s the problem of getting anyone so genuinely nice and kind and good to actually Do Bad Deeds, so you can see that in practical terms our family is just not cut out for skillful bad-deed-doing.

So it’s conceivably a somewhat sympathetic chord being struck that makes me kind of like tales of really inept criminality. Yes, it’s also that the stories all end with comeuppance for miscreants, because if you’re really a clod among crooks, you will get caught, and I am after all a great goody two-shoes at heart. But maybe one with a hint of a mean streak, because it’s probably pure Schadenfreude that makes me truly enjoy tales of ineptitude among the nefarious.

photos + textHey, Who’s the Real Bad Guy Here?

One day I was evading the police pursuing me,

And by a mere coincidence, I bumped into a tree

That happened, oddly, by surprise, to tip onto a house

And through its roof, which crumpled down, startling a rabid mouse

That shot across the neighbors’ lawn and bit their Shih Tzu dog,

Upon which, he upended, deathlike, in aphasic fog;

The neighbor lady found him lying stiff-legged on the lawn

And started in with CPR* to save him, thereupon

Shocking the Shih Tzu back to action, sending him a-pounce,

As though he squirted from her arms, to give the mouse a trounce

That sent the rodent racing back to its familiar haunts,

And by the tree, it spotted me, quite startled for the nonce—

The both of us, indeed, taken aback for just that blink,

Until a second later it occurred to me to think

There were some coppers on my tail, and if I didn’t scram

They’d find me gaping at a mouse, and clever as I am,

I reached instead and grabbed the little critter by the tail

And strapped him in my seatbelt, so if any went to jail

It would be one that, anyhow, had terrorized a pet,

Whereas I’m just a burglar, and I ain’t bit no one yet.

[Note for my Canadian friends: not referencing the Canadian Pacific Railway here, although I suppose one could make the argument that running a train over an unconscious being might forcibly restart his heart with a powerful squashing, if it didn’t kill him outright]

photo

Rumors

Mellie’s tidy garden

Upon the gatehouse roof

Is rumored to conceal some things

Of which we have no proof.

It’s pretty for its own sake, yes,

With dainty flowering plants

But the idea it’s secretive

Is really what enchants

Roof gardens are quite magical

All of their own accord,

But we like thinking Mellie’s

Best, for hiding untoward,

Suspicious things not seen at first,

Perceived among the flowers,

But only yet imagine

In our impish idle hours.photo

Do What You Love and Love What You Do

Posted on by
23

photoDear Me:

Flee specious “requirements” in your life. Think about what is honestly mandatory, absolutely required for survival, health, sanity, legal purposes or whatever. Don’t be dragged into what other people say is right without considering whether it’s right for you and for the world as well, or influenced into doing and being things that have nothing to do with your own real values and needs. Decide what does make sense for your efforts, and do the work that it requires.

Especially, find the most palatable, preferably appealing, ways you can to accomplish those ends. If you’re to spend any of your time and labor and energies on doing Necessary stuff, you really ought to be doing it by the most pleasurable means possible. Life offers enough pokes in the eye that can’t be avoided, so why subject ourselves to any we can sidestep? Rather nicer to seek out the ways in which we can accomplish our goals, meet our needs, achieve the desired ends, by doing things we enjoy and surrounding ourselves with good people and environments. The more enjoyable the compulsory and obligatory parts of life are, the more quickly and happily we complete them. The more swiftly we cover those bases, the more time we have for doing and being the things we prefer and desire most. Follow the example of those greats whose accomplishments are or were shaped by both their pursuit of natural abilities and inclinations and their will to open new doors and find new loves. It’s my belief that work is one of the most egregious four-letter words ever invented, that minimizing the work I absolutely have to do in life and, further, converting any so-called work I can’t avoid doing into something I like doing anyway are highly honorable goals. Paradoxically, I suppose, that’s something I’m willing to work at constantly.

Love, your constant friend and co-worker, Myself

photo

Imaginary Friends in High Places

Posted on by
27

I never made a secret of being less-than-optimally mature and having an imagination that makes Attention Deficit look laser focused. Let’s be honest, keeping that reality quiet was a non-starter idea anyway; that particular cat shot right out of the bag before I even escaped my own play-pen, and, well, I was an early climber.

And speaking of climbing, I was a social climber from the beginning. I kinda think I’m better than I probably actually am, if you take my meaning. No, I never gave a serious fig for name-dropping (though, boy-howdy, the stories I could tell you!) or for impressing people with my associations with prestige. Not only do I find overt fawning generally an embarrassment except between actual friends, I’ve always been too poor, too cheap, or both when it came to buying Name merchandise. Not to mention that I think rich retailers should pay me to advertise their products, not vice-versa, and so on those rare occasions when object-lust converged with mega-sale, I am the person who instantly took said objet home and blacked out the corporate logo or sat and snipped it off the clothing, stitch by stitch.

All of this information is not as off-topic as you might think. My theme, you see, is that I think pretty highly of myself just as-is. Now, no doubt there are those detractors that might hasten to add that “it’s a dirty job but somebody’s gotta do it.” I’ll leave them to fester in their own frightful fallacies. If indeed my fine self image is problematic, there might be some other persons fit to share a portion of the blame with me: parents who subscribed to that bizarre notion, unconditional love; teachers (not counting my third grade ogress) who actually taught and encouraged me. Family and friends, too, who still unfailingly clothe me in the cape-and-tights raiment of someone admittedly far better than I am but for whom I am quite willing to be mistaken while I’m yet busily aspiring to become them.digital photo illustrationMeanwhile, I can tell you that I’ve always had a pretty good sense of this being surrounded by earthly and supernal cheerleaders to assist and enhance my sense of personal privilege and well-being in the world. It keeps me on a relatively even keel.

Now, if you happened to be on board here when I’ve previously mentioned coping with anxiety, clinical depression, phobias (yes, I’m a veteran of all of those), nerd-hood, weirdness and being 17 (I’ve survived all of those too), it should be as obvious as the strings carrying Ed Wood’s flying saucers that I am neither perfect nor so deluded as to think myself so, let alone be immune to self-doubt and those temporary bouts of dis-ease that rate various positions on the inadequate-to-self-loathing slide rule.

But thanks to this even more deeply ingrained, however fanciful, liking of myself, I have always eventually recovered and returned to my standard state of cheery self-hugging enthusiasm. I think I’m a little like those boxers’ training dummies, taking a righteous smack to the schnoz from time to time that floors me, but always eventually sproinging back upright with my vapid but genuine grin on my face, just happy to be here. Because, by golly, I really do think I’m kind of swell.photo

Awash in Sentiment and in Love with Loveliness

Posted on by
25

photos + textAbsolutes

Marvel with me, if you will,

that water never flows uphill,

that whiners know no dulcet tone,

and ants leave nary a cake alone;

that day follows night and night the day,

that parrots always have something to say,

that money’s scarce in holiday season,

and you love me still, despite all reason.

digital collageNaturally, I Thought of You

I stepped onto the broad parterre to make a painting en plein air,

but found, instead of gentle breeze, the air was cold enough to freeze;

instead of fresh and sunny scenes, a garden growing wilted greens;

I’d hoped to capture nature’s glory–saw, instead, an allegory

teaching me: the garden pales, the skies grow dim, and nature fails

and seems all doomed to soon be dead–so I just painted you instead,

and in your portrait, found that kind of natural joy I’d hoped to find.

Tiger in the Tall Grass

Posted on by
19

We have a watch-cat. Our relationship with Him is very simple, so simple in fact that I cannot say for sure whether He is actually male. Clearly we do not “own” him; cats are seldom owned but rather ‘run operations’ as it is, but in this instance we are talking about a cat whose relationship, if any, is with the people living about four houses down from us. But he patrols the neighborhood, and seems to take particular care checking the perimeter of our place, both house and property, daily, so he is ours in that way–or we, his. In any event, he has no name here other than Watch-Cat, because being a businesslike and vigilant gentleman he seems to require no other, and we have both grown quite attached to him.

My husband isn’t even a so-called cat person, since he has allergies to those of the feline persuasion, which makes this arrangement ideal for him, and seemingly so as well for Watch-Cat, because on those rare occasions when we see him making his appointed rounds while we’re outside rather than observing from a window, he prefers to halt in his path or step aside discreetly while we pass and then continue unperturbed on his way. He’s a compact cat, appearing younger than I think he is because he’s fine-boned and small and sleek, but has such admirable equanimity and steadiness of purpose that I cannot imagine but that he’s fully mature.

photoWatch-Cat has a fine domain here, as we live on a wonderfully peaceable road with no through traffic and our modest property is bordered, however closely, by the fenced gardens of very kind, if nearly invisible, neighbors at either side (all of them also rather fond of small creatures) and by an excellent small leafy ravine with a sometime-stream that bears both the city’s storm drain access and the more meandering waters of ordinary rain runoff. Additionally, the greenbelt there has an outstanding mini-forest of oak and soapberry and elm, some lacy variety of Mahonia that is almost visually impenetrable by virtue of its large-numbered community, and enough other friendly brush that the birds, possums, raccoons, rabbits, foxes (so I’m told), armadillos and the elusive-but-heard bobcat all find it exceptionally homey and inviting. There is plenty to keep Watch-Cat’s vigilant attentions at any given time.photo

[Disclaimer: This armadillo does not live in our ravine, but nearby, so I’m pretty sure he has cousins in our ravine.]

And while he apparently eschews suddenness or unpredictability, he is in fact a fine guardian for our place. I have observed his managing with a certain sang-froid a rather noisily growling stare-down from a much larger and more imposing stranger-cat that dared to come hulking uninvited into our territory. I’ve seen Watch-Cat zoom up a tree after a piggish squirrel nearly the cat’s size and tell it in no uncertain terms that it was not welcome to be quite so impertinent. My favorite indicator of his dominance over the wilds of his territory was when we had afternoon guests one day, and as we sat in the front room visiting I looked out the window next to us to see Watch-Cat sauntering by with a small dark snake in his jaws. The snake hung limply on either side, looking remarkably like a very impressive bandito mustache on the handsome little black and white cat, and it seemed to me a perfect representation in that way of his insouciant approach to running his universe here.

That said, I think it’s fair to guess that Watch-Cat has an admirably confident sense of his authority and value in the world, one indeed from which we could all take a lesson. I’m quite certain that if he happens to catch his reflection as he passes by our windows or if he should pause at the ravine’s tiny stream, what he sees looking back at him is a magnificent and unconquerable beast, the ruler of his marvelous territory (where, luckily for us, he allows us to live as well), and the beneficent master of all good things. Who are we to argue with that?

photo

Who's the Kingliest One of All?

I curtsey now to our little king of the suburban jungle, because it is Thanksgiving Day, when I am particularly aware of how many people–and creatures–do their part to keep us safe and sheltered and loved and well attended in every way. Including you!