Kitty Love

The cat and I went on "walkabout" this morning. He gets the wanderlust every now and then, and decides to explore a little, or as much as his 87 (in cat years) body feels like on a given day. This was the day.

We've been here for a year, and kitty has gone on walkabout maybe four times. Usually he's content to stay on the patio and the sidewalk that runs beside the sunroom, and he prefers it if I leave the sliding door cracked enough for him to come inside when he's ready.

This morning he decided to walk part of the way with the dog and me down to the end of the drive for the newspaper. He didn't go the whole way, the driveway is long and covers three acres, but he went as far as the crossfence, smelled of the newly turned dirt there. I let him linger as long as he wanted. He gazed beyond the fence to the deer pasture next door, and lifted his nose into the air. His ears telescoped this way and that, hearing the morning birdsong and probably lots of other sounds known only to him, and perhaps the dog. They both love to go out and roam. When the kitty had enough, he turned and went back towards the house and his usual safer hangouts, the downspout where a lizard sometimes hides, and the concrete patio by the sunroom.

I've had this cat since he was a tiny kitten, abandoned by his stray mother, a hauntingly beautiful Persian someone had left when they moved away. This was at another house, 12 and half years ago, a different life than now. His mother abandoned him in a pile of brush behind the greenhouse in our yard. It took me 45 minutes to coax him out and into my arms. I had been without a pet for seven years, didn't really want another one, but he was such a sweet little scared thing.

He's seen me through some big life changes, and has seen a few himself. In my lifetime I have had seven dogs and three cats, and feel sure there will probably be more of each in my future, but I doubt somehow that any will own a bigger piece of my heart than this particular kitty. I admire the silkiness of his fur, a kittenish softness that he has never lost, probably handed down from his Persian-haired mother. His markings have a symmetry that I also find pleasing, even now that he's grown fat and elderly. At times he is regal and aloof, with his mysterious golden eyes and curved forehead, but usually he's a lovebug who wants nothing more than to lie in my lap and be petted. Because he was born to a stray, he's always tended towards skittish, but he's also courageous and can be a bit of a brute. I've laughed at his total domination and intimidation of the SO's shepherd. From the very first day they met, the cat let the dog know, as he chased her down and slapped her all over the house, who was in charge. She still, over a year later, gives him a wide berth, and she's at least three times his size.

The SO has been doing tractor work lately, and is, as I write this, riding by the window on his old blue Ford, disking, readying the ground for winter rye and a few oats for the deer who browse through on their nightly rounds. This place was neglected for ten years before we moved here, and the ground and grasses, flowers and trees, are mending slowly. There is so much to do to bring a place back. The grounds were once pristine, with a sprinkler system that no longer runs, and with carpet grass throughout. We see patches of it around but have only been able to reinvigorate the small area between the drive and the house.

I have promised myself that I will work on something this week -- some writing project, still wanting to get to the children's book. I have a handwritten draft, and have probably avoided it for so long because I'm afraid to find out that what I have is really rotten. However, I do believe that it's absolutely necessary to give yourself permission to write badly in a first draft. If you don't you'll never get the first word down at all. It doesn't have to be Tolstoy on the first go-round. In fact, I'll bet my life Tolstoy wasn't Tolstoy on his first draft either. So I will buck up my courage, face the ugly first draft, and get it on the computer where I can edit it into something worth reading. Fingers crossed ....

Time to get to it. Onward ....