Wow. I’m in the single digits now. Pretty soon our cats will have to start earning their food. Our newest unexpected bundle of joy has been doing that. We’ve developed a routine whereby he allows us to pet him for about 30 seconds before he’s fed. He earns that canned stinky cat food with some subtle kneading of the rug and discreet purring while we pet him. Best of all, he hasn’t punished us for forcing him into a pet taxi so we could take him to our vet. He was one unhappy, terrified boy but I have no doubt the vet and technicians cooed over him … as we often do.
And he plays. Oh, goodness, can that boy play! He’s definitely entertainment I would pay to see. Here are some photos of him in action.
As you can see from three of these photos, he moves fast and he likes to jump. He likes to run into things.
He’s just adorable.
I’m pretty sure our other three know something’s going on in the garage, but they’re not talking. Our temperatures are getting cooler, and they’re more interested in finding a free lap than acknowledging a potential intruder.
I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday. I’m grateful to have had a few days off. Friday we went on a slow walk through the Timberlane Ravine and, for a while, went our separate ways. My husband was hunting for bugs. I was hunting for photo opportunities.
It was late morning and the light was warm and magical.
The trees and their roots seem to take on human form, like legs intertwined or a woman stretching.
As usual, I looked for tiny things whether it be a little lizard or tiny funqi.
And flowers. I have to have flowers even if it means getting down on my arthritic knees.
The image on the right is one of those lucky moments. To get that photo, I had to position my iPhone on the ground, snap the photo and hope for the best. It had started to rain lightly as we were leaving, but I didn’t know until I cropped the photo that I captured a few raindrops on the lovely, delicate flower.
I hope you all have a wonderful week. Until next time, play well and play often.
The “R” bomb meaning retirement, resignation. Gee, those words really sound kind of depressing, like I’m resigning myself to retiring into oblivion. But that’s not how I see it. I might retreat further into my bubble when I retire, but my bubble needs some serious attention.
I read recently that people who work from home find that their homes are messier, not cleaner, because of it. Think about it. When you work from home, you use your kitchen, your bathroom, all your rooms more, creating more messes. During the work week, I might do a load or two of laundry in-between meetings but I can’t do any real housework during my work day. I also notice my home’s grittiness and dustiness more since I’m here all the time.
My first day of retirement, I will sleep because I’ll need energy for my second day of retirement when the cleaning starts. I’ve warned my husband. Then, a week later, I’ll be spending more time writing and taking photos. I want to do more of this:
I don’t know what kind of plant this is. No doubt some kind of wetlands, marsh-type plant since it lives on the border of a stormwater facility. But I love doing this: taking photos and then playing with the images, trying to get an insect’s point of view. [Speaking of insects, check out a short documentary on two entomologists–Charlie and Lois O’Brien–called “Love Bugs.” It’s available on PBS.]
Below is a different plant, but no less fascinating.
I’m still undecided about when to spill the beans, to share that I’ll be moving on soon. I’m taking it one day at a time because there’s still a lot going on in my little corner of employment. I worry about people being angry at me or disappointed in me. It’s not that I don’t care about my co-workers or the work we do. It’s because I care that I took on more responsibility back in May.
My introverted, highly sensitive self is just tired, worn out, burned out, stressed. But that’s not what I want to say when I drop the “R” bomb. No, I must be honest. I’ve been given an ultimatum.
My husband said he’d leave me for an older woman if I don’t retire.
Meanwhile, Raji seems to be adapting to his confines. I can’t quite say his home because I really don’t want him living in the garage permanently. Even if he has his own outdoor playpen.
Sometimes he’ll sit just outside the pen, taking stock of the surroundings. My husband put a bird feeder near the pen so he can be entertained by birds and squirrels. Raji often sits up on his hind legs. I think he might have a bit of meerkat in him. He’s also started kneading the very soft and fluffy cushions on the shelves.
Raji still plays approach-avoidance games with us. If he’s hungry, he’ll come as close as he needs to get food. He’ll eat dry food from my hand if that’s his only choice. I have to be careful though. A couple of times he almost bit off a chunk of my palm. When we feed him wet food, he might tolerate his forehead being stroked. But as soon as he’s done eating, he backs away (sometimes literally) and keeps his distance.
And yet …
He’s playful. He has a favorite wand toy. The wand has a long ribbon of colorful fleece attached and Raji will leap over and under boxes and buckets to get to it. I gave him one of my husband’s old socks stuffed with catnip and he rolls around with that, rubbing it over his face. He’s also taken ownership of a purple yoga towel of mine, curling up on it with the catnip sock.
He makes direct eye contact with us, and “talks” quite a bit. He seems calm and settled for the most part. Saturday I worked out in the garage for about an hour, something I hadn’t done since we brought him in. He curled up on a fluffy cat bed and watched me.
It might be the weather–it’s gotten a bit warmer the last few days–but he’s also spending more time in the pen. So we are hopeful. Next Saturday we’ll take him to our favorite vet for a physical. I expect our progress will take several steps back after that.
To all my friends in the U.S., may you have a wonderful holiday. Don’t overindulge or you might wind up like these two (ha, ha, ha).
First, let me talk about flowers. As some of you know, I’ve developed an interest in photography, an interest I hope to indulge a lot more in about 11 weeks. Macro-photography fascinates me, and a few weeks ago I bought flowering plants to challenge my photographic skills. Following are photos of an Purple Aster, bought before it started to bloom. These photos were taken over four days.
It’s fun watching flowers bloom on your own back deck, trying to find the right light and the right moment. During the work week, that isn’t as easy as I’d like, even though I do work from home. Blame it on meetings.
And now, a Raji update:
For those of you who missed the excitement of my last post, you can read it here. In the week since I wrote that post, we managed to get Raji confined to our garage. Poor little guy had hurt his right front leg jumping down from the roof of our shed. We didn’t want him gallivanting around, making it worse so we coaxed him in with food (of course!) one evening and shut the cat door.
Oh, was he pissed about that! I had never heard a cat complain so much. He has quite the repertoire as well. Not just the usual meows for Raji, but howls, trills, pips and peeps. And he kept us busy playing hide-and-seek, except he was the one always hiding. One of his favorite hiding places is our canoe which hangs against a wall. Watching him climb boxes and books and then slip into the gap is much like watching a kid climbing the stairs to his room, loudly complaining the whole way.
We had arranged to take him to our vet, but the appointment was a few days off. We were worried about his leg, the fact that we were expecting heavy rain, and the lack of sunshine and fresh air in the garage. So more or less spontaneously, we took him up to a spay/neuter clinic and got his pom-poms snipped. He also got his rabies and distemper shots, tested for HIV and feline leukemia (both negative), and his claws clipped. His leg wasn’t swollen and the clinic vet said the pain meds would probably help with that. After we brought him home, he wanted absolutely nothing to do with us.
Then our worries changed to whether he would eat (and through eating, take his pain medication), whether he would use the litter box, or whether he would just curl up in the canoe and die.
Happily, within 24 hours, his appetite was back and he had peed in the litter box. I’m sure you can imagine my delight when, another day later, I found an impressive pile of poop in the box too. And so we go. He has a great appetite, and the more I study him, the younger I think he is, perhaps not yet a year old. He still does not like us to touch him, but he tolerates our furtive pets and strokes while he eats. Although he insists on social distancing, he’s become comfortable enough with us to groom and play while we watch like doting parents.
We want to keep him confined at least until he sees our favorite vet at the end of this month. Because of his apparent youth, however, I’m loath to release him to the wilds of our neighborhood … ever. To make his current confinement tolerable (at least to our conscience), we bought him a playpen and fastened it to the side entrance into our garage.
We have this luxurious penthouse set up so when the side door is opened, he can go in and enjoy the fresh air and sunshine while still being held prisoner. No surprise that he has a lot of complaints about this.
Raji has inspected every possible flaw in this setup, searching for any gap big enough to squeeze through, and giving us a piece of his mind while he does it. We’ve bolted, strapped, and twist-tied the pen in place, and secured wood panels where a kitty’s head might stick through. We were not only afraid of Raji getting away, but of him getting stuck. So this is a daytime playpen, to be used only when we are up and about and available to check on him frequently.
I guess you could say the adventure has begun in earnest now. The slow, thoughtful and patient process of getting Raji used to us, comfortable with us, and then (fingers crossed) integrated into the household.
For now our three indoor kids are in denial. They do hear Raji chattering away in the garage, but pretend not to. Their ears, however, give them away. In the meantime, Junior still claims my sandals.
Thank you for reading! If the news is getting you down, find a good distraction, like adopting a semi-feral stray cat. Believe me, it helps :)
I’m continuing my countdown in perhaps a more upbeat tone that I had when I started. The next 70-some days will be rough for this country, no doubt. I’m no Pollyanna, but I can be optimistic. I’m old enough to know that staying calm, being patient, and holding on to hope can see me (us) through all kinds of hell. Forgive me for the tired cliche, but the light at the end of the tunnel has gotten brighter. For the first time in a long time, I feel that my country and I might actually be going in the same direction.
But you’re wondering about this new man in my life, aren’t you? Well, he’s not an adult, more like a teenager. But, oh, is he handsome!
This is Raji, an orange tabby that has been hanging out in my neighborhood the last couple of months. We originally thought he belonged to a family a couple of houses up from us. They have an orange cat but, after doing a bit of math, I realized their cat would be a lot older than this youngster drinking out of our water fountain. At first he’d run away if we approached him, but over time, he got used to us.
Finally, my husband put some food out by the water fountain. He was starving, so hungry that he tolerated my husband’s presence although he didn’t want to be touched.
In times like these, I turned to my neighbors across the street. They know everything about the hood. They used to have dogs that they would walk around the hood and, according to M, dog people always talk to each other when they’re out and about. They no longer have dogs. They now have a cat that used to live with someone else but decided she liked these two ladies better so she (the cat) adopted them (my neighbors). That’s usually how it works.
I texted M about the orange tabby and learned that he had frequented their backyard too. They had named him Raji, which M said means “hope.” They could tell me who he did not belong to. We all agreed he was likely homeless. I reached out to the hood and beyond through the NextDoor app and received a lot of supportive comments but no one stepping forward to say, “Hey, that’s my boy!”
My husband and I mobilized at that point because it was getting cold (well, cold for Florida). I outfitted a pet taxi with fleecy blankets and stationed it on the back deck where he sometimes appeared. He had also made appearances in our garage if we had the side door or garage door open, so we set up a feeding station there, with some soft bedding.
Raji was a very hungry cat and it took little coaxing to get him into our garage for his meals. Although he was skittish around us (“you can look, but don’t touch”), I hand-fed him treats a couple of times, stopping only because he mistook my fingers for food once too often. Our neighbors brought over some food that their cat didn’t like.
And now here we are.
To say my husband and I are smitten by this handsome fellow is an understatement. Just look at that tail! We expect he’s quite young. His teeth look very white and sharp compared to our old geezers.
He hasn’t been neutered. He’s packing a pair of pom-poms large enough for cheerleading. But he’s sweet. Our boy kitty–Junior–sometimes goes into a frenzy when Raji is on the back deck, howling like the Werewolf of London. Raji doesn’t pay him any mind, just sits and looks around at the birds and any other bright shiny object. [While Raji’s presence annoys the birds and squirrels that visit our yard, thankfully he’s an awful hunter.]
So next steps are to set up an appointment with our vet so Raji can be poked, prodded and scanned for a chip. We plan to “trap” Raji in our garage (i.e., close the cat door) and entice him into a pet taxi with food. We already know this works … heh, heh, heh.
I didn’t want another cat. We have three indoor, one of whom is now nicknamed Million-Dollar Maxine as her vet bills continue to climb. They are a huge responsibility, and they have created a rhythm in our lives that I don’t want to ruin. My husband calls them “anchor kitties” because we can’t do much traveling as long as they’re with us. And Raji will be a difficult experience because of Junior.
Junior can be a bully and has already demonstrated that he does not care for this interloper. He picks on Maxine and Wendy when he’s feeling hungry or just plain feisty. But he’s my boy and all I can do is tell him that over and over …. as well as let him sleep on my sandals.
But Raji has decided that he likes us enough to hang out after he’s had a meal. He could just leave but he doesn’t. He hangs out with us, sometimes playing with the catnip-stuffed sock I made for him. He’s making himself at home in our garage and in our hearts. It’s been 7 1/2 years since we last took in a kitty–Wendy. I guess it’s time :)
This is Junior’s reaction to the idea of a new cat in the household.
I love the number thirteen. That and the fact that I got an extra hour’s sleep this weekend made me feel quite chippy on Sunday. Monday (today) starts week #13 in my countdown, so for once I actually looked forward to Monday.
To a point anyway. This will no doubt be a stressful week because of the election. I am going to do my best to avoid reading the news until Wednesday … if I can. I’ve always been a bit of news junkie so it’s an effort, but I’ll have plenty of distractions (as in, meetings, meetings, and more meetings!).
Meanwhile. We went for a walk on Sunday, a gorgeous day with sunshine and coolish temperatures.
Here are a few scenes.
Talk about hanging in there! This tree doesn’t want to let go and I don’t blame it. It’s a lovely environment, full of dappled sunlight and rich vegetation. Worst case scenario: it’ll become a home and food for critters and birds so life will continue.
How’s this for a still life? I did not stage the fern, sticks and fungi. The composition caught my eye, and I took photos from several angles, but this is my favorite.
Aren’t these so pretty? I see patterns like this and I immediately think of knitting, of all things, imagining myself knitting up sweaters or shawls in these colors and lines.
And some more. They also make me think of full skirts that swirl when you dance.
Now this is something I wouldn’t want to blindly grab. Greg says it’s a “devil’s walking stick.” It can be quite beautiful when it’s in flower, but it’s November so no blooms.
Ah, that’s it for today. In just over three months, I’ll have more time to regale you with my photos and chatter. For now, I’m just counting down and enjoying the start of some real fall weather.
Even our cats are starting to assume their winter behavior.
You only see Maxine tolerating Junior’s butt in her face when the temperatures start to drop and she’ll take any body heat she can find. Junior was soaking up the sun, silly boy. If you look really close, you can see that Maxine actually has a paw draped over Junior’s feet. Like children, they are so adorable when they are sleeping.
Thanks for visiting! Hope you are all well and safe and happy. My friends in the U.S.: Remember to vote on November 3 if you haven’t already voted, and hang on to your sanity. I think it’s going to be a bumpy ride.
About a month ago, my husband and I went on a bike ride through the Aucilla Wildlife Management Area. In hindsight, I guess it was a kind of prep for the ride we’d take at St. Marks Refuge (15 Weeks and Counting #wfh #newchapter #nature). A prep that would make biking at St. Marks feel like we were riding on clouds.
We had a few obstacles at the Aucilla trail, such as:
A rather large tree that we wound up carrying our bikes over rather than under. The silver lining to this impediment was that no big noisy vehicles could get to the other side.
And plenty of potholes.
This was by far the largest, and the one before which I fell off my bike (I took the photo from the other side.) I’m not always graceful when I fall although I try. All’s the better if I know I’m going to fall, which I did in this case. I kept my head up while loudly proclaiming that I should have worn my helmet because, “Honey, you know I always fall!.”
But the worst part is getting up. I avoid putting weight on my left knee because I don’t like pain. Instead, I have to get on all fours, put weight into my palms, lift my knee or knees, push with my hands, and then rise. Here’s where I say a little prayer of gratitude for the many years I’ve been practicing yoga.
A couple of days later I found two large bruises, one on the inside of my left ankle and the other on the inside of my left thigh. Oh, the joy of aging. Not only is my bruising delayed, but so is my memory. Took me awhile to realize the bruising was from the fall … at least I think it was.
But I digress. The other joy of aging is that I feel more like a kid and enjoy getting dirty. I proudly sported a thin layer of crusty gray dirt on my right side for the rest of our trip.
And it was worth it.
On our way back, we stopped at this beautiful spot, so green and lush. The soft sound of the breeze through the trees could have lulled me to sleep.
I enjoyed the clouds above …
and the clouds below.
Again, the kid in me was mesmerized by the reflections in the water. Okay, so I don’t have to be a kid or feel like a kid to be mesmerized by nature, but these experiences always remind me of when I was a child and would fixate on leaves reflected in a puddle or …
or the delicate world of insects.
I hope you enjoyed coming along with me. Stay safe and well, strive for happiness, and VOTE!
In fifteen weeks, I’ll be able to spend more of my time doing what I did on Sunday: biking at the St. Marks Refuge (SMR).
My husband and I used to walk the 12-mile loop, although for me anyway the last two miles were more hobbling than walking. These days neither of us can manage walking the 6-mile loop. Bad knees, bad back, less tolerance for heat and humidity. But we have bikes.
Here’s a few scenes from our Sunday excursion. We were blessed by the sight of a bald eagle. I really think the bald eagles at SMR are naturals for photo-ops. We were surrounded by natural beauty. SMR is a special place for us, and spending time there always lifts our spirits.
The wildflowers were abundant.
A resting spot.
One of the many waterways at SMR.
My trusty hybrid.
A bald eagle posing as if he had been waiting for us.
The bayou filled with water.
Soft pastels gracing the trail.
It was a beautiful day, even if it got a bit warm (85 degrees). The horseflies were out and about, but thanks to our bikes, we could outrun them … sort of. I had been wanting to bike SMR for a long time. We biked it once, a long time ago, and I always wanted to do it again. Now that I know I couldn’t complete a 6-mile loop much less a 12-mile loop with my arthritic knees, biking is the way to go.
I hope you enjoyed the trip. And I hope you are all well and safe and holding onto hope.
As if I needed another reason to anticipate a new chapter in my life, I received word yesterday that an anthology of essays and poems on aging–including one of my own–has just been published!
Look at this cover! Isn’t it wonderful!
Nancy Peckenham is the editor of Crow’s Feet. Life as We Age, a Medium publication (https://medium.com/crows-feet). You don’t have to be a senior citizen to write for Crow’s Feet. You just have to write about aging, whether it’s a personal essay, a poem, a short story, or a researched article.
Crow’s Feet has published a few of my essays on Medium (most of them were about my hair, of which I have very little right now … hmmm … might be an essay there). And now Ms. Peckenham has done me the honor of including one of those essays in this new anthology.
You can get a copy at Amazon (click here) or Barnes & Noble (click here).
You can also follow Crow’s Feet on these social media:
I’m counting, that’s who. The remainder of my current employment. The number of weeks until I commence my new employment where I’ll be working for … me. Just me, myself, and I.
It’s interesting that the only “work” people seem to understand is that which you do for a company or a government. That if you say you work for yourself, people assume you don’t work at all. It makes me wonder how work is defined.
I think of my mother who held a minimum-wage job for decades (that is considered work) and who managed to keep a house and raise four children mostly on her own (isn’t that work?).
I work everyday. On average, I spend 40 hours a week tethered to an employer who pays me by EFT. The rest of the time I work to keep my house relatively clean, my clothes relatively clean, my cats relatively clean. We run errands (quickly) to make sure we have enough food, cleaning supplies and wine.
I work at staying healthy and fit. I exercise, take walks, work out in our garage, practice yoga.
The work that I want to do but haven’t been doing is writing and reading. Well, that will change in about 16 weeks. I’m counting down. The first thing I plan to do after I resign is sleep.
I’ll keep going for my early morning walks. I’ll still sit at the computer after my walk, but instead of “logging on” to my employer’s network, I’ll log on to my life as a writer.
In the meantime, I’ll take my bliss where and when I can get it.
The surprise of finding a paper wasp in one of our hurricane lilies.
Or the glory of a colorful morning.
Sometimes I get lucky with the sunrises. Sometimes I’m enchanted by a different vision.
While I hate driving in fog, this vision delighted me. I was walking, of course.
I have a bit of fun with my iPhone camera and an app (Insta Toon).
Don’t I look like someone who needs sleep? At least I no longer need a haircut. Temps around here went up to the mid-80s, with itchy humidity to boot. Impatient with trying to get a hair appointment, not to mention to pick out a hair style I can live with, I grabbed my husband’s beard trimmer.
Guide #4. Roughly a 1/2-inch all around. Greg, dear husband that he is, did the finishing touches. Then I had to trim off his hair. We’re twinses now :)
Wendy doesn’t think much of our antics. Here she is, sticking out her tongue in distaste.
I hope all of you are staying healthy and safe. I hope you all are finding some bliss–even if in snatches–during these strange times.
Good friend and great writer John W. Howell has a new novel available! Please follow the link to Jill Weatherholt’s blog where she is participating in the launch for Eternal Road – The Final Stop.
Today I’m so excited to welcome our friend, writer and blogger John Howell as we celebrate his latest release Eternal Road-The Final Stop. John is one of my favorite bloggers…kind of like a second father to me. If you haven’t already, I hope you’ll snatch up a copy today. I’m looking forward to this book, […]
While you’re at it (and after you’ve picked up a copy of Eternal Road – The Final Stop), check out John’s blog at https://johnwhowell.com/. You’ll find short stories, “johnkus” (John’s variant on the haiku), visits through his lovely neighborhood and lots of puppy pictures. I don’t visit him as often as I’d like and that hurts because a visit to John’s blog always brightens my day. He also has the best sense of humor.
So off you go! Buy a copy of Eternal Road – The Final Stop and become a John W. Howell fan (if you’re one of the very few who isn’t already).
Marie at 1 Write Way 