Day: October 24, 2013

Lulu, Fanny, Simon. Letting me know it is time for a cookie.

Faith Is mine,
I can see angels

hovering by your ears

clearing their throats,

polishing their trumpets,

wetting the reeds on their flutes,

plucking the strings on their violins,

gathering wood for the evening fire,

winking at you, afraid

to show themselves to the world.

Faith is mine,

A creative soul is someone

who can pour light into a cup,

then raise it to nourish your

parched and yearning soul,

your beautiful, holy spirit,

seeking to be free.

Faith is yours,

hear the angel chorus

bursting into song.

A few weeks ago, I wrote about Flo as the Queen of Bedlam Farm, I rarely wrote about Minnie, who I rarely saw. I realized today that Flo is a bit out of joint – I suspect cats can be drama queens, and she came up to me outside and began yowling loudly, as in complaint. I picked her up and sat with her for awhile, and she was momentarily mollified. There is no way to explain to a cat that another cat has momentarily displaced her because she had a leg amputated and requires care and attention. I have never paid so much attention to cats or written so much about them. I remain much more comfortable with dogs, cats are elusive and mysterious, which is fascinating.

People keep asking me if there is a book in Minnie’s troubles – child or adult – and there is not, really, I am not drawn to writing a book about cats, I am not as focused on them as I am on dogs, and I don’t think I would be credible writing about them. I feel I have learned a lot about dogs, I don’t feel that way about cats. And I have two strong cat personalities to deal with now, because Flo came her and conquered the place, and I could see today and over the last few day she has no intention of vanishing and letting Minnie hog the limelight. I tried to convey to Flo that I have not forgotten her, she will always been a Queen to me.

I went to visit George Forss in his Ginofor Art Gallery yesterday and he showed me his new George Forss Theater Of The Arts, consisting of a green sofa he got off of the street, 14 speakers he salvaged from garbage cans and dumps, and two flat screens he has assembled, one on top of the other. In between lessons on light, settings and focus, George used a shepherd’s crook I gave him to adjust the sound volume on the speakers – he has to do it one at a time.

We listened to Haydn, and then to Elvis, a sometimes jarring but eclectic mix. George is planning for readings, talks, film showings in his new theater, I am proud to have suggested the name. George and I are different in many ways, a lot alike in others, we make sense to each other. Neither of us cares to be told what to do by other people, we are both given to impulsive leanings and enthusiasms. It was a great lesson as usual, George gave me a photo portrait of himself and Donna Wynbrandt, he is in his underpants. I have it on my wall. Red came into the gallery, saw there was no serious work to do, and went to sleep.

I went into town today and had this odd sense that people were laughing at me, not in a cruel way, but as if there was a private joke going around that I was not a part of. I am a strong-willed person, I live in my own head and because some people think of me as a celebrity (I don’t ever think of me in that way), they might not tell me what they were thinking. Connie Brooks of Battenkill Books knows me too well to be impressed by me, and she always tells me what she is thinking. “Everyone in town is laughing about you,” she said, “we all know that Minnie is not going outside to be barn cat again, but from reading your blog, you don’t know it yet.”

Connie said many people in my town have been reading about Minnie and getting a good chuckle out of my repeated statements here that Minnie would be returning to her life as a barn cat. “There is no way,” said Connie, “that that cat is going outside again permanently.” I had to laugh, too, it is always interested to have the bubble you live in popped sometimes.

I take Connie’s point. As I write this, Minnie is sprawled out on a dog bed in the living room, Flo is outside in the cold barn. I still think she will return to her life as a barn cat, although I will be the first to acknowledge that the things I think will happen and the things that happen are often distant cousins. Maria thinks Minnie will go outside again also, and we both think that is what she wants to do. Connie just chuckles when I say this, and the cashier at Stewart’s, a local convenience store, just laughed when I said that, she said I was “cute.” And the clerk at the Food Co-Op said she put $ 5 on Minnie retiring as a barn cat and moving into the house, at least for nights. Connie was right, the town is having a good laugh over this.

I think barn cats love their lives, I have never had a barn cat – not once in 15 years – want to come inside, or get inside. But true, when I think of Minnie and Maria snuggled up on the couch each night and remember Minnie, still crippled, blithely taking over the bed of Frieda, a cat and rabbit and raccoon eating hunter, then perhaps I am not really paying attention to what I am seeing.

In all good faith, as I write this, I will tell you Minnie will be returned to her life as a barn cat, I believe it is what she wants and what we want. I also believe it is the best thing for her, the healthiest and most natural thing. But when you are in the middle of something, I know it is quite possible that you just can’t see what everybody else can see. I suppose we’ll know in a week or two whether or not the joke’s on me.