DatingGod

From Pollution to Yield

My house was broken into a few weeks ago. They kicked in the door, stole the jewelry box, and hightailed it out in approximately 2 minutes, or so says the local cops who came to investigate when I called it in. They called it a grab and smash - only easily pawnable jewelry - not computers, tvs or other such traceable, serial numbered stuff.

It took a few days to see the beauty in it all. The retired, constantly home neighbors who texted me that a strange car was in my driveway while I was a work, then that my door was left open. Another neighbor who called a carpenter friend who sent his crew over in less than an hour to nail the door casing back into place so that I wasn't in a house with a front door that wouldn't close. The young hottie beautiful neighbor who called me over that night to hang out and drink and smoke greenery and compare stories past of stolen stuff. A super friendly agent and super efficient insurance company that paid the claim in less than 24 hours of filing. But mostly it was about the deeper permaculture of it all. 

One of the aspects of permaculture that I love the most is how it uses everything. There is no such thing as waste. Or rather, if you have waste, you're not doing it right. 

Permaculture looks for loops, circles, spirals instead of lines. If something is being carted off your land, out of your life, this is a line, and it's because the stuff is viewed as pollution that needs to be removed. Sure, one person's trash is another's treasure, and there is absolutely value in this (I have a friend who's a freegan who is going to teach me the fine art of dumpster diving and show me this principal in motion, which is awesome). But at the microcosm level, it is likely a signal that a loop needs to be closed. 

For example, in my backyard, which is set on a slope, rainwater rushes from the highpoint on the northeast, erodes the soil in a direct path all the way down to the southwest, where overflow then floods my neighbor's yard. Also, my annual beds, planted in the southmost area of the yard - the only area that gets ample sunlight - needed to be watered from the municipal water supply fed hose last year, and because I didn't have the time and energy to put in a drip line, was watered from the top which contributed to the powdery mildew that took over the melons and squash.

So to get water from where it is "pollution" to where it is "yield" I researched and then created a diversionary swale with a ~1 foot berm. It cuts diagonally across the land, using gravity to push it along, until it hits small breaks in the swale with smaller berms directing it into several points along the length of the annual beds, with the far end opening into the woods at the edge of my land so that any big excesses don't flood the annual beds but go into the forest which will happily lap it up. 

This is the raw, newly created diversionary swale and berm:

With two days of solid rain coming, it'll soon be easy to see how much water is moving and where so the swales and berms can be tweaked if necessary. Then the berm can be filled with and the swale covered in wood chips to help with the safety of a trench running through the middle of the yard, as well as keeping the water channel open and moving.

So, see? From pollution to yield. 

The thing with jewelry is that most everyone sees it as "yield". But in fact, my jewelry had identified itself as "pollution" just a few months ago. All of it except for one necklace and one pair of earrings, both of which I had on when the burglary occurred, so are now the only pieces of jewelry that I have. 

So, yeah, the jewelry was taken, along with the big wooden music box it was all stored in. And also, Calhoon and Cassidy's ashes, which were likely taken because they were in a silk jewelry pouch next to the jewelry box, although maybe the last earthly remains of Grandma Booty and The Hoon were snorted that night alongside some shots of Thunderbird, a sort of new age feline cocaine to add weaselly love to the party.

Also gone were the diamond earrings and ring, heirlooms from my great grandmother from when my ancestors had homes and servants and an island. Plus earrings, rings and bracelets from girlfriends and boyfriends and clients long gone past. Crystal pendant and stone stuff I'd bought myself over the years. Random bits of saved metal and crystal. All of it: pollution.

Even the ashes were pollution, because half of them had been sprinkled across the garden beds last year, and the half that remained only served as a focal point for the occasional lament of loved ones gone. And who needs that when the truth is that all stuff - animal, vegetable, mineral, mental, emotional or spiritual - is on its way to somewhere else and we are dang lucky if some love stuff stops and hangs with us for a while? 

One of my favorite things to do is smoke greenery, drink homegrown wine coolers (wine, fresh fruit, club soda run through the vitamix, then topped with lime squeezings) and walk around my house and land until some sort of art/permaculture/hijinks occurs. Sometimes I dance in the mostly empty living room, sometimes naked running through the rain in the backyard. Other times I move furniture in a feng shui frenzy. About six months ago, I put dozens of holes in my bathroom walls, inserted decorative nails and hooks, then emptied my jewelry box out onto them. 

I thought it would be beautiful, all sorts of sparkly things surrounding me whenever I took another aromatherapy bath or brushed my teeth or peed with the ever present kitty sitting on my lap. But instead, it was just a bunch of memories of folks come and gone, because I never wore any of it anymore, not in years. So a couple months ago, I took it all down, replaced it with some odd twisty branches, some colored headbands, and a fox skull found while out in the forest.

For a few weeks, I made myself wear some of the rings, put on a necklace for a few hours. But it all felt uncomfortable, as if it imprisoned me in some visceral way. And so I shut the jewelry box lid and only kept out the one jade pendent and green glass earrings that I always wore on the few times a week I felt like wearing something.

And a couple of months later the door was kicked in, the stuff was made off with, the cops came, a report was filed, an insurance claim was submitted, and the pollution transformed itself into yield with the arrival of a large claim settlement check, enough to live on for two months. Considering the fact that I just quit my job, to me this was proof that the beauty of pollution to yield was Life saying: hey, girl, I still got your back. 

Permaculture is transforming my land, and along with it, my living. Who knows what will bloom this season? 

Wave Riders

Back in January I applied for the perfect public health job for me. A fellowship - so they'd be teaching and training me. An amazing project on a cutting edge aspect of health care reform. With a top notch non-profit with a 15+ year proven track record. Flex time for working hours. 1/2 hour free during work hours each day to exercise. Healthy stipend hiring range. 

I got an interview, and as they're in Chapel Hill, they humanely let me do it on the phone. I was really sick that day, but took some of those decongestants they make meth from and was able to breathe and think so did okay. I got a second interview, this time with the CEO, and again they humanely let me do it over the phone. This time I'd had a killer day in Hiveworld, and with the phone interview at 4pm, I drank a big mug of green tea beforehand, which made me a little manic, but again, I did okay. They narrowed it down to three candidates. For the third and final interview, they asked me to come in person. 

The week before, my boss in Cubicleland asked me to apply for a permanent position with them. The interview time of course was scheduled for the same day. I talked to my boss, and this is what a genuine prince he is: he let me take the day off to drive to Chapel Hill, and allowed me to interview for Cubicleland the day before.

After the Cubicleland interview, my boss called me into his office and said he hoped the Chapel Hill job went terribly and we had a good laugh. Then he said: seriously, there is opportunity for you here, in a couple of years, you'll be in management and in a great career for yourself. I thanked him, genuinely thanked him for all he's done for me, and told him I'd keep it all in mind.

I drove up to Chapel Hill, taking a half tab of a beta blocker my doc had prescribed so that I wouldn't have to manage that god-awful heart pounding that kicks in in interviews for me. (I used to be queen of the interviews, but now that I hate talking about myself, interviews are murderous :) And it worked. I met for a group interview with four people, plus another staff member teleconferenced in. They started out pretty guarded, but by the end we were laughing and making jokes and sharing inside comments about feng shui. They rocked the casbah. I actually had a good time at an interview, and was able to tell them and show them what I genuinely had to offer them, let them see what I'm genuinely like to work with.

The following Friday I got a job offer from Cubicleland. And on Monday, the non-profit. As crazy as this sounds, I told them both I needed to think about it. Because on Thursday, Jacinta got sick. (I didn't tell any of them what was going on, just that I needed some time)

I had a feeling I'd get the public health job too, but on Friday I made the decision to accept the Cubicleland job, because a move would be too hard on Jacinta. I looked at my sweet sister and got: f*ck the perfect job, let's get you healed.

But on Saturday, I faced how sick she was, and looked at the big picture. Not just what I wanted in the moment. But all of it. My life, the lives of the kittens, and Jacinta. After her treatments and tests, I was down to $2000. That's it. After that, if my car broke down or Baby Wallace's virus flared up again, we were toast. And accepting the public health job was out of the question, because there'd be no money for the move.

And it wasn't that I didn't want to go into debt for Jacinta, it's that what I had left wouldn't be enough. The next round of tests and treatments they wanted to do - another ultrasound $375, a feeding tube $600, tests and treatments for her lungs - would have used most of what funds were left. And if those three things didn't work, we'd be done. Not just Jacinta, but all of us.

And so in the early morning of Saturday, tears streaming down my face, I asked the vet: should I do it? Will it likely cure her? And she said that the other two vets she'd consulted with said that a case of pancreatitis this acute didn't bode well, at all, and since the treatments so far weren't working, at all, there was most likely an underlying condition like Cushings or heart disease, which would mean a whole new area for tests and treatments, which at that point, we wouldn't have the money for.

And then I looked at my friend, my sweet sister, and saw she was dying, she had been for days, and in that moment I saw the way through. I didn't like it. But I didn't grab ahold of her and cling for dear life like I had with Grandma, or The Hoon. Instead, I let the whole of the situation flow through me, let the truth of all of it, wash through me, inform my heart and brain and limbs. 

In that moment, I felt an adulthood I'd never experienced before. An ability to truly see my own living in the light of What Was Really Going on. I could see through Hope to the Truth that lay beyond it. For a flash of a moment, I was a warrior on a battlefield, and I saw that this was a battle that was lost. I could stay on the battlefield with my dying friend, and die with her, or I could help her die by my hand, not at the hand of the compassionless enemies coming for her, collapsing lungs and heart, or what Wallace, Emmaline, Malcolm, and I would face without resources.

I had them leave us alone in the room for a while, and talked to her, held her, her body just the week before sturdy and solid, now as light as a feather. Then I let go, and I helped her let go too. And I helped give her as peaceful a death as I could.

And of course, my mind has gone over and over and over everything. It wants to punish me, for the choice I made, because Jacinta is no longer here, and that is unacceptable to the mind. Someone is to blame, and because I took full responsibility for everything, because I only sought council from the vet, and only briefly, making the decision completely on my own, it knows I'm to blame.

If I would have had $5000, I probably would have tried. But I always empty back out at the knowing I had in that moment, the knowing I still have, that it wouldn't have mattered. It was the end of her life. With money we could have prolonged her living, but the quality was declining and would have steadily gotten worse.

And at some point during this week as I've been talking to her, wherever she is, I said that I hoped when it's my time, there's someone with me who will help me end my life peacefully, and that I die in their arms, knowing how much they love me. And I mean it. I hope that my own death will have the meaning in someone else's Waking Up, that hers has had in mine. Because the love that moved between us helped me grow up. 

It doesn't mean I'm off the hook. I know that I'll carry that in my heart and mind for the rest of my life. I took the life of my sister. Just as I took the life of my brother. That's how it is in this world. Death comes for all of us, and sometimes it comes with pain and suffering. But it doesn't have to. But the price? You have to be grown up enough to pay the price. 

And so Saturday I took her life. And Sunday the kitties and I were surrounded by a profound sense of relief, of love, of Yes. On Monday, the public health job offer came through. On Tuesday morning I picked up Jacinta's ashes, along with a small mold they'd made of her front right paw. On Tuesday afternoon, I accepted the public health job. And yesterday, I drove up to Chapel Hill and found the perfect apartment right outside of Carrboro, and signed the lease, with for the first time, all the kitties' names on it as well. (Can you imagine a place more perfect than one with a landlord who wanted the kitties' names on the lease because they're tenants too?)

I don't write much these days for so many reasons, but mostly it's because I usually don't know how to write about what I'm going through. It doesn't show up as Waking Up, but I'm pretty sure it is. It's about healing the life, about letting go into what Life wants, while at the same time, opening the arms and heart to what I want, what I feel is true for me. It's about holding the possibility, the hope, the opening, while at the same time holding the rejection, the ending, the closing at the same time. The experience is like walking a tightrope, a razor's edge, because you can't fall to either side. Or suppress emotion as it rises, nor hang on to it when it does. 

It doesn't sound like much of a big deal: to hold Death while simultaneously living Life. But it's huge. It changes everything. 

And there has been an enormous shift in my psychic and shamanic abilities. I've been able to use them for clients for years. But for myself? Not so much. Truthfully? Hardly at all. That's changing. And it's wild to watch.

I knew I only needed to set up the one apartment viewing, but I didn't know why. Was it perfect and I wouldn't need to look anymore? Will the public health job offer be rescinded and the landlord is so nice he'll tear up the deposit check and lease? When I got lost twice looking for the apartment, and then the landlord's home to sign the lease, I began to tone and chant, connecting to guides and animals exactly as I do when in session with clients. Driving down interstate 40, I did a healing session on myself. And I turned it over to that power I feel that's greater than myself (just like I do when with clients, so that the energy can pour through me, into them, but now it can flow into me, too). I didn't pray for the details of the How, only the result of the Yes: my ability to see what the real deal is, and then the courage to act on it, to do what needs to be done, whether it's say No Thank You, or sign on the dotted line.

And I don't know what's going to happen. I only know I'm following the same psychic and shamanic info I've been giving clients for years. Something in me finally acknowledging that I'm worthy of it.

So even posting is a tightrope act. Needing to write, to place story around what's unfolding, maybe to continue to leave breadcrumbs. But also protecting this process that I'm in, that I'm going through, from the bozos who do that to folks who are in the tender shoot rising from the earth and reaching for the sun phase of Waking Up. 

I'm so grateful for you folks out there who love and send me and Malcolm and Emmaline and Baby Wallace well wishes. For you gentle folks who somehow manage to transcend distance, your love traveling down the wifi and into our hearts and minds.

Much love to you too. We send you love and well wishes too. Keep to your course, burrowing inward. Keep trusting your life process. Keep living in motion the knowing that Life is unfolding your own Waking Up through the circumstances of your daily living. 

Know that you are loved. Always. All ways . . . 

Sweet Jacinta

This post is disjointed. Maybe I shouldn't press publish, but I get that I need to write it. Because I need to deal with my grief somehow, and this is all I know to do in this moment.

Like with The Hoon, I've known for months she was going to go. Even as I understood that taking her to the vet wouldn't do anything, wouldn't stop what was coming. But feeling it coming helped me be clear in loving her. Even though before then, for the past few years, I've been loving her like every day would be our last.

That sweet weasel was so loved. And she loved me so deeply, so hilariously and with so much slobber. Kittens are loving, but Jacinta and I had a long time love. 12 years. We knew each other's stuffs. I'll love her for the rest of my life. And if there is something after this, I'll be loving her in that space too.

But of course the past few days, with all I have going on right now, I've been distracted, and when she called to me on Wednesday early morning, when I was sitting here at this computer checking emails or surfing or something equally as inane, I remember kind of brushing her off.

Thursday morning she didn't eat. Thursday night when I got home, she still wouldn't eat, so I called the vet for an appt the next morning. By 8pm though  she was in bad shape. Throwing up bile. In terrible pain. 

1:30 am and $475 at the emergency clinic later, they ruled out liver and kidneys. 9am the next morning and $610 at the vet's they ruled out a cancerous mass, and diagnosed a mild to moderate case of pancreatitis. Almost tapped out for money, they loaded me up with DIY supplies - a hanging bag for sub-q fluids, syringes for pain and nausea meds, and for feeding. They kept her for the day to dole out professional love, attention and meds, and I picked her up after work, took her home.

But she only got worse with every passing hour. By 2am she was crying in pain, and I gave her pain meds, all the pain meds, all five doses for the weekend all at once. It helped. But her breathing grew labored.

By 4am I knew what the deal was. Actually, by the time I set up the first vet visit, before the emergency clinic, I knew. But you have to go through all the steps, right? 

The worst thing would be for her to die in pain, even if it was at home in bed with me, or god help us, by the side of the road like with Cassidy. The second worse thing would be for her to die in that godawful emergency clinic. So I kept a vigil. An all night vigil by the light of the full moon. Watching her breathe. Doing energywork. Speaking sweet words to her. I didn't talk much. Because I finally, for the first time in this life, understood that love doesn't need to be spoken aloud. But I know hearing the tone of it always made her purr, so I when she was in the worst waves of pain, I spoke to her in that language I always spoke to her in, and through her pain she could recognize.

If things got too painful, we'd go to the emergency clinic. If not, we'd hold out til the vet opened in the morning.

I watched the clock go 4. 4:20. 4;45. 5. On and on until we made it til 6:30.

We got to the vet's by 7am. They let us in at 7:45. 

Lungs filling with fluid. Maybe a heart issue. Maybe the pancreatitis was secondary to something else. Maybe Cushings. Maybe there was cancer that wasn't caught by the first tests. But it all requires tests, procedures, money. Lots of it. But would it even help? Would it make her well?

I just realized one of the things that has been so painful about the past couple of days is how I kept trying to distract myself from the fact that she was dying. Is that what I'm doing now? Trying to distract myself from the fact that she's dead? Or am I facing it more clearly by this writing?

But I do what I know to do. So I do this.

I had five appointments with holistic clients today. I cancelled them all, for folks to reschedule for tomorrow or next weekend. The old me would have muscled through them. Let my heart be all raw and ripped open and mythic. But this person I'm becoming understands that there is no need for heroics. I'm grieving. My sister died this morning. 

Then my mind, the cold, evil part of it says I'm a heartless bitch to kill my friend because it costs too much to keep her alive. I let it pierce my heart, because there's truth in that. I have about $2000 left in credit and cash. I know it wouldn't have been enough. I know the most any of this would have bought is a year or two. Maybe. Maybe only days. Or ten days, like with The Hoon. But I weighed all the possibilities, of having three other kitties to care for, a possible move for a new job in a few weeks, the insane debt load I already carry from school, from the first year out of school before I began making money again.

I told the vet point blank: no heroics. If you feel strongly, let's do it, but I don't want to keep throwing things at her, torturing her like she was last night. No more pain for her, no more suffering. We need to do the right thing. And she said doing the kind thing would be to let go. And even though I knew I didn't need her permission, or her approval, it helps me now, in this moment, when the evil part of my mind rises again.

And then my mind remembers last night, the pain, the suffering of my friend. And I'm so grateful I had the courage to tell the vet No More. And the vet said it's the kindest thing. And in the moment I felt an adulthood I hadn't before. Not out of my mind crying. Crying yes, but focused, clear thinking. 

While the vet prepared things, I talked to Jacinta. Just saying all the things I've always said to her, the same phrases over and over the years, the things I'd sing. She purred. And gave me the love look, the first time since before she got sick. In those moments, I felt her understand what I was doing, and feel relief with it. She could feel me loving her, loving her like I always did. Keeping her safe. Protected. 

Even if I couldn't protect her from death, I could protect her from pain. I could help her have a peaceful death. 

And so they gave her a sedative. Then took her in the back to get the iv port in place. Then came out and placed her in my arms, and let us be together for a while. I waited til she and I were ready, then when someone came in, very gently, to check, I nodded. The syringe emptied, and a few moments later, she flinched just a bit, then her heart stopped. 8:32. 

I stayed with her until her body began to lose warmth and I could feel she was gone. I smelled her fur one last time. Kissed her sweet head. Then handed her over to be cremated.

The vet computers went down. Estimated bill $500 more. They say I can pay it when I pick up her ashes.

It'd be easy to post this without talkinbg about the money. But of course this is also about money. About money, love, adulthood, courage, willingness, gratefulness, broken heartedness.

Driving home in the impossibly bright Carolina sunshine. Then to deal with urine and vomit soaked sheets, blankets, rugs. Clothes covered in urine and drool. In the wash. Needed to clean out the parts of her that were only about the last two days. Although a part of my mind inhales the scents, and yearns, because all it knows is this: this is Jacinta.

Malcolm and Emmaline and Baby Wallace, all so extra kind the past two days. To me. To Jacinta. They keep coming and laying on me, giving me love looks. Emmaline came twice last night to keep vigil with us, not scared away by the sound of Jacinta's pain and labored breathing. Baby Wallace keeps checking in on me, squeeking and sending me love. Malcolm is in my lap right now, purring, purring.

Outside my window, birds and trees. The sun feels obscene. But then I remember how much Jacinta loved the sun. And I feel how the sun and Jacinta will always be intertwined in my heart and mind.

I'm the only one left now of my tribe of the Hacienda of Ckats. We were about healing and chasing adventures and being bold and snuggling and snacking and watching tv and being a good family to one another. Brother Calhoon. Grandma Booty. Sister Jacinta. Now just me.

I have a new tribe. Yet we're not sure what our deal is yet. More shall be revealed. We're a young family.

Jacinta.

Can't take it back. She's gone.

I miss her.

I love her.

Baby in the sun, 2005:

 

Baby In The Sun, one last time, taken yesterday evening right after I brought her home, 3/18/11:

 

Glorious Prismatic Twitch

It feels like I'm in a kind of death throes. But instead of more physical spasms, it's energy put into the life, and emotion, and fight. Dreams, compulsions, attachments, ideas, projects, opportunities bloom in technicolor, surround sound, then poof into nothing, or down to mere shadows.

At first it felt disappointing. Then kind of confusing. But as I began to see the patterns, the perfection in each tiny core, I felt awe for whatever it is that powers, fuels these bursts of worldy Yes, these wild flingings of color across the screen of my consciousness, my living. Now it's just fascinating. It's so curious: where will the energies lead next? What will be left behind when they disintegrate into fairy dust or sand or whatever it is you call this sort of energetic compost?

The trick is to give myself whole-heartedly to whatever is moving through me. I watched all four and a half seasons, some 75 episodes, of Friday Night Lights in less than three weeks. Applied to a couple dozen public health jobs. Spent about four days utterly absorbed in Evbogue's minimalist and cyborg-second-self energy. In hindsight, I see how each of these transforms me in some way, turns on a light in my consciousness around some sticking point inside of me. Watching FNL plugged me into some sort of headspace where I could see people consistently, repeatedly making Human Adulthood choices, even when Life was totally handing them a blisteringly raw deal. Evbogue showed me how to release a metric ton of cyber weight. But I don't know until the other side what the benefit is going to be. The trick is to let if flow. And when it's done with me, let it go.

I've witnessed a lot of beings leave their bodies. Some go gently - my grandmother, a baby bird I held in my hands - their breathing slowing and lightening. Some go suddenly, like The Hoon, from the meds they injected him with to save him from a more painful leaving. And two of my loved ones went fighting, tooth and nail, fighting, fighting to breathe up until the very end.

Burned in my brain is the image of Cassidy, fighting for breath as I raced through morning rush hour traffic, trying to get her to the vet. And how I finally pulled over to the side of the road, so that I could focus on her, really be with her as she went through the last few moments of her life. And how the look on her face as she left was one of surprise. As if she were stunned that another breath wasn't there.

Watching a loved one die a hard death changes something inside of you. It makes you vow, solemnly swear to all things holy, to offer up whatever Life wants the next time a loved one is dying, offer up to Life whatever hope or dream or morsel of visceral tissue it cares to take in exchange for a more peaceful passing. When The Hoon began to go, I called the vet and had them come over to end it quickly. People put pets "down" all the time. But The Hoon wasn't a pet. He was my family. Would you be able to inject your 16-year old brother with a shot that ends his life? How about the adopted child you raised from infancy?

And so after these deaths I held the very real energy of death close to me, understanding that I could set it down if I wanted to, but that it would mean throwing away the love vibrating inside of me for them. I understood on some very deep level that it was a package deal: hold the love, hold the death. And it transformed me. Burned things out of me I didn't even know were stuck inside of me. It torched bullsh*t disguised as relationships, crapola masquerading as kindness, and a roiling vaporous mountain of pointlessness dressed up as life choices.

But the trick is to keep the death close. Keeping death close keeps the breathing deep, the eyes clear, the heart open. It reminds constantly: this might be the last look/kiss/word/breath. Too much Life, not enough Death, and the living goes all dewy-eyed and delusional. Too much Death and the only option appears to be to go out onto the front lawn, lay down, and not bother to get up. But to hold both, simultaneously, fills a heart with unspeakable joy.

So as I watch the death throes, these rainbow spasms of I Am Alive! arise and then exhaust its energy, I breathe, and give thanks. Maybe all of this is just another brain party, another flare of made up mythic. Maybe death really is just a doorway. Whatever it is, all I can think about is how I can give my living over to Life even more, let Death wipe my living more cleanly.

Death and Life can both have me. It's their timetable. They let me try my hand at my living for so long, and while I often had a heck of a lot of fun, all I did was f*ck it up twenty-three ways from Sunday.

Now it's their turn. They can have at it.

Why not?

Emmaline Takes A Header and Lives to Tell the Tale!

For many years all the weasels were fine. A ding here and there. Stuff as they grew older. And then Grandma got sick and died, then The Hoon. And since then, all the kitties here at the Hacienda of Ckats one after the other, have had various ailments, all of them either serious and life or body part threatening or chronic and requiring all sorts of intensive daily care and whatnot. For you hard core long time readers of DG, see if you can Name That Kitty:

1. Several times a day, had to have the hardened snot wiped off/out of his little kitty nostrils so he could breathe, blew actual snot bubbles out of his nose like a cartoon, could sneeze 13 times in a row and come out raring to put someone, anyone in a headlock (he can and does still do the latter).
2. After the implantation of a radioactive seed to stop the growth of the thyroid tumor she spent 3 days in an isolation room, and was so distraught over the whole process, that instead of keeping a 10-ft distance between us like recommended for safe radioactivity levels, she spent the next week suctioned onto my body like a barnacle.
3. Spent six months having pills pushed down his throat, bad goop wiped out of his eye, good goop squirted into his eye, sneezing snot all over me and the furniture and the food, two seperate rounds of kitty paw swollen like a spatula, and many months with enough herpes mouth sores to qualify as a gigolo.

The answers are 1) Malcolm 2) Jacinta 3) Baby Wallace

The only kitty in the bunch who was the radiant picture of health was sweet Baby Emmaline. Tiny little Emmaline, with her sweet face and even sweeter tiny tongue up my nose in the mornings. Bright flying Emmaline, biting the heads of Malcolm and Wallace with equal fearless ferver. Bodacious brave little Emmaline and her bold quest to get high.

As of Sunday at 4pm, our girl has been benched, joining the rest of her small tribe here in the Hacienda in our long standing membership of the Badge of the Walking Wounded.

She took a flying leap off a window sill, caught her back hind leg on a towel rack, and fractured her knee, breaking the kneecap almost clean off the bone. Then commenced over the course of 18 hours: one hysterical katmama, two trips to the vet, another trip to the feline orthopedic surgeon, one surgery to reconnect the knee with metal rods, a $1500 credit limit increase from Care*credit tp pay for the estimated $1400 surgery and recovery, and one very stylish red cast.

She had the surgery yesterday evening, the surgeon called me afterward to tell me all went great, and I went to see her this morning before I came into Hiveworld. She was high as a kite, her eyes enormous sweet inky pools of infinity. And sweet. So very sweet. Did I mention how sweet?

She can't come home until Wednesday or Thursday and then has to be immobilized in a small space so she won't be able to run around for 6-10 weeks, but she's okay! And there was fundage to pay for the surgery! And Life is good!

Crazy, strange, wonderful, rollercoaster life . . .

(I'll post a pic of her in her stylish red cast later on this afternoon . . . :)

Learned Passivity

I need to live with animals, can't imagine living without furry weasels roaming about. But I understand a little of what it costs them. 

All of the animals I bring in are rescues. If I hadn't have taken them in, they likely wouldn't have found homes. Jacinta was rescued from behind a dumpster, where her alcoholic human caretaker had thrown her when he'd broken her leg when she was four months old. The Hoon and Grandma were found in a strange, dark "pet store" in Brooklyn NY that also housed rescued animals. And Wallace, with his many dings and snots and goo would have most likely been a hard sell for anyone other than me and my dreams of him.

But when they come and live with me, they give up the outdoors, the catching and biting the heads off birds, of stalking the wild salamander, the grass rolling and fence climbing and sun lolling. Because of my choice of suburban or urban living, their experience of nature is through a window. Kitty tv I call it, like most people do, but I've stopped laughing when I say it now.

When Wallace first got here, he practically hurled himself against the screens to get at the birds and bugs and wiggly things. But over the months, he's learned that the things outside can't be gotten to. And so he watches. He sits at the window, body draped on a table or a chair, or propped up on a pillow in bed. His paws rest on the window sill. And he watches, eyes darting wildly as the bird flies not ten inches from where he salivates. But he's learned not to move. Only his eyes reveal how excited he is, how engaged. Except for his twitchy tail of course. 

I bet this is how I look at night, curled up on the barcalounger, watching my latest hulu or sidereel obsession: The Mentalist, John Doe, Century City. During the day, I listen to other people's stories, at night I watch other people's stories. 

Wallace is kept from the world for his own safety, kept in a box because of the horrors of speeding cars and virulent fleas and illnesses. I'm in my box because of choice, because of a belief that the world of human interactions holds little interest for me. But is this true? This watching? This safety?

Pulsing

Sundays I clean, do laundry, go for a hike at the nature preserve down by the ocean. Starting in the afternoon, I cook my meals for the week's lunches: kale and collards, quinoa and lentils, brown rice and black beans, salads with avocado and toasted pumpkin seeds and olives and slivers of red onion. Today I'm cooking a special late lunch for myself: lasagna made with rice noodles and organic mozzarella. It's the first time I've had cheese in a couple of months. This is the sound of me taking many extra enzyme capsules, while also salivating, oh good lord, yes.

Wallace grows big and strong. Still with dings here and there, signs that the virus is still not fully vanquished, but he is fluffy and sweet and full of the punk lusciousness of a pink skinned, red-furred adolescent. Jacinta snuggles and growls and smiles and naps and snacks and has many siestas in her cave up in the laundry closet. We are family. I got all my fuzzies with me. Even the ashes of The Hoon and Grandma Booty are parked next to the bed so that we still do family sleeps every night.

My novel came in third in the novel contest's paranormal genre. Sure, there were only three entries, but the editor that did the judging passed on a note to me that said she found the writing fresh, the heroine strong, the novel partial very readable, and that would like to read the whole novel, to please send it to her. I never thought for a second that I'd win any aspect of the contest. But I knew that I should enter. Now I know why. Or at least a part of the why. More shall be revealed. 

I've been on four public health job interviews in the last two months. None as horrible as the first, but still, not a single one of them what I'd call wonderful. And of course no job offer. Except for my cubicleland social work job. It looks like they are going to offer me a full time job with benefits. And I will most likely accept it. Because the whole deal these days is to do what is in front of me, to stay out of my head, out of fantasy and conjecture and thought and do the next practical thing. It doesn't matter what I "prefer" or "don't prefer". It's about doing the next thing. And then finding the ways that it fits, playing the notes it demands. Wax on, wax off. Just do it and the mouth, keep it shut.

I got asked out a couple of weeks ago by a ridiculously hot guy. After a few hours of fluttering stomach and peachfish contractions I got: not this. And so after he'd called me a couple of times, left me a couple of notes at my cubicleland job, I turned him down. He keeps calling, but I don't answer my phone anymore. It isn't about whether he's cute or interesting. It's about whether his energy fits with what I'm doing, if being around him feels like a Yes. It doesn't, and so I spend gentle evenings snuggled with kitties. 

I'm happier than I've been in a long time. A rhythm is pulsing strongly. I'm grateful. And I plan on continuing to show it respect by only engaging in actions that contribute to it's lovely luscious basso thumpthump, thumpthump, thumpthump.

Life is good . . . 

Yes . . . Yes . . . Yes

A quick post to let you guys know I'm okay, we're okay, Jacinta and I are okay.

I'm in the process of a huge shift. Not just because The Hoon is gone, because my tribe is no more. But also because I'm turning away from huge chunks of Not Me, emptying out it's echos. Setting things in motion to support I Am That I Am. Work and the novel and relationships and health, all changing, all on the move.

I've been through something sacred the past two weeks. And something profoundly human. Calhoon's dying process, and how I had to be to go through it with him, opened up deep realizations in me. The kind of realizations that you read about for years. The ones that never really make sense until something like this grabs you by the ovaries and heart and several layers of visceral tissue. And the grief is so profound that you beg for death. And yet the sense of aliveness is more intensely radiant than anything you've ever felt. And Life turns your whole body, your entire being, into a giant heart, and you walk through your living pulsing with grief and wonder and love and awe.

Jacinta stays with me constantly. She is grieving, too, and the nearness of my body soothes her. She purrs continuously. We wake in the morning and snuggle and tickle and discover. I smooch her tiny, sweet face. She licks my neck with her scratchy tongue. I coo. She purrs. And we can face the day.

There is no longer fear that The Hoon will slip away, forgotten. His ashes are mixed with Cassidy's in a green embroidered silk pouch, nestled with crystals and stones on the dining room table that has been converted to an altar, where candles burn night and day. Sometime in the future, I'll know that it's time to let their ashes go back into the earth, maybe in a forest, maybe at the beach. It might be years, but I can now feel it's rightness. He's gone. And it too, because of it's Is-ness, is Yes.

So we're okay. Life moves on. New flows, new love. Moving on from some energies, the negative, the faux, the fearful, no longer needing them, letting them go. Opening widely to others, the loving, the truthful, the Now, breathing them in, feeling them fill body and consciousness. Deeply surrendering into the flow of living, no longer fighting the gates and walls, knowing that Life has the wheel, that all we have to do is let go . . . let go . . . let go . . .

Because Yes is all there is . . . always Yes . . . all ways . . .