Thursday, December 29, 2011

Tuesday, December 6, 2011

Monday, October 17, 2011

Loolie Blue 200?-2011


Loolie aka Callie.

Sometimes a cat comes into your life to teach you how to live. They show you how to love, they show you how to stay in the moment - and how to ask for what you need and not one bit more. Just what you need. They teach you how to accept the love that is given to you - and how to ask for love that is waiting in the wings. Loolie taught me more in her brief period here than many people have managed to do by sheer force. She knew how to enjoy life and let things roll off her back. Loolie was never aggressive, and passively taught people to bow to her every whim by the sheer good nature of her smile and the offering of a soft belly. Admirable behavior for a calico.

Loolie was born in a section 8 house on Brookside - sometime around 2002 or so. She had a litter of kittens on her first heat that somehow disappeared without a trace. Loolie managed to move on rather easily from what could have been a traumatizing life event to grab a life that she envisioned in her remaining time here. The family who owned Loolie moved out unexpectedly on Christmas eve and the young son came and took Loolie off my porch, where she had grown accustomed to staying and finding food on a regular basis, to travel with them to their new home. Twenty four hours after the family had moved, Loolie appeared back on my porch - which made me extremely happy. After a trip to the vet to get her fixed, my cats didn't want her in the house, so she lived outside where she had been living much of the time. We decided to name her Loolie, after a relative of Marian's. We made a cat house with a wool sweater bed and she stayed there most nights. But ultimately, Loolie wanted a house where she could be an only cat, have her basic needs met, and perhaps some decadent ones too. She found that in the home of Karen Doepke, my next door neighbor and friend. Karen treated Loolie, or Callie as Karen called her, like the queen that she was... half & half cream filled breakfasts, caviar lunches and filet mignon dinners. Loolie was no fool - she'd found herself a good home where she could have a wild time and also nurturing and love.

Neighborhood cats are definitely the best. They see and experience everything. They bask in all the greatness of communal living, and yet manage to be the bridge we all need to encourage us to connect. Loolie probably had many homes that spoiled her, and she deserved every one. She was a serious cat, but just as much a very playful cat too. She loved chasing a wandering stick or a bouncing string and like any cat that still has instinct intact, she sacrificed an occasional bird. Loolie had a kind light in her sweet eyes, an understated beauty in her little body and a gentle spirit that could be a model for all of us. I will miss her immensely. Miss her walking the first part of the block with Maggie and me, miss her meeting me at my car - playing games through the hole in my gate, and reminding Maggie with a simple look, exactly who ruled this roost called my porch. She died a peaceful, quiet death after a battle with kidney disease. She is survived by her two favorite admirers, Karen and Ursula, and also Merle, who loved Loolie despite her admiration of the many birds at the feeders, and all of the other admirers she had in our neighborhood who will go unnamed but know who they are. She has gone on to the land of everlasting curiosity...and our street will not be the same without her.

By Loosie bluesie...love you.

Friday, September 16, 2011

Monday, January 31, 2011

Monday, January 24, 2011

*

Lines for Winter

Lines for Winter

Tell yourself
as it gets cold and gray falls from the air
that you will go on
walking, hearing
the same tune no matter where
you find yourself—
inside the dome of dark
or under the cracking white
of the moon's gaze in a valley of snow.
Tonight as it gets cold
tell yourself
what you know which is nothing
but the tune your bones play
as you keep going. And you will be able
for once to lie down under the small fire
of winter stars.
And if it happens that you cannot
go on or turn back
and you find yourself
where you will be at the end,
tell yourself
in that final flowing of cold through your limbs
that you love what you are.

Mark Strand







Tuesday, January 18, 2011

Monday, January 17, 2011

Choconut Valley Farm

Friendsville: The house I was born in...
















Choconut: The house where I grew up....