There is absolutely no point to writing if you cannot be honest and every day I sit down at my computer and before I write, I ask myself if I am being honest. I took this photo of Minnie the barn cat and Maria this morning, Maria was holding Minnie in the Pole Barn and Minnie was transported to a place of love and connection. Minnie is somewhat miscast as a barn cat, she really ought to be a house cat. Flo is a barn cat, independent, tough and territorial. She is loving, but not needy. Minnie, I think, is needy and perhaps ought to be a house cat. She will not be a house cat with us.

I have to confess that I do not love Minnie, although I am fond of her. My wife has the gift of loving all things with a great openness and passion, she is a Buddhist at heart, she re-homes spiders and bugs rather than kill them. I do not love all of our animals equally. Dogs are not donkeys, donkeys are not chickens, chickens are not barn cats. I have a problem with needy animals, they make me uncomfortable, and I know one of the reasons I love Flo is that she loves me when she feels like it, and doesn’t feel like it all that much. I understand that intimacy is frightening to me and it comes into play with animals all of the time.

I love border collies because as much as they love me, they love work more, and if something happened to me, Red would be happy in a flash on another farm with sheep. This is as it should be in my mind, I wouldn’t want it any other way. I have little to do with Minnie, even though she comes around every now and then, purring at me and wanting to be picked up. I don’t do it. I am glad that Maria does. Even so, I make sure Minnie is well cared for, as does Maria and I wonder if one day I can open myself up to her. Animals mirror us, they reveal us in so many ways. That is their gift.