Kitty Chronicles

Trick Daddy almost died the other day. He's our seven-year old cat, black and shiny, sensitive and moody. Strangers don't really care for him. He isn't very nice to them. He hisses and haws. He looks crazy-eyed and aggressive. He's swiped a few house guests here and there.

We found him in 2004 in Dave's old condo complex. According to the vet, he was probably one years old. He was crying and roaming and looked unkept and lost. When we offered him milk, he lapped it. When we opened our door, he jumped on our old black leather couches and started cleaning himself contently. Every once in awhile he would do a little happy cat twist for us.

He was dirty and scrappy and we figured full of disease. We bathed him and he let us. He still does to this day. We put out a plate of rocks for him to pee on that night. I did it to soothe Dave, figuring it would never work. It did. Our kitty peed on a plate of rocks. To this day, he's never soiled a floor.

He never wanted to leave again. We frequently opened the door so he could find home, if he had one. He refused. To be honest, we didn't look too hard for any previous owners. I mitigate that sin within myself by reassuring myself that he was either abandoned or ran away from home.

Through the years, Trick stayed with me as Dave and I moved in and out of each other's homes as we navigated our young relationship. To us, Trick has been the picture perfect cat. A lap cat. The kind of cat that nuzzles in the morning and purrs by your ear. An indoor-outdoor cat for years, he always would come when he was called. At his nightly curfew, I could call into the dark apartment parking lots of the apartments I lived in, and like a black panther, I would see Trick barrelling across the yard running towards me. Eager to please. Like a puppy.

Unfortunately, due to his extreme intolerance of others, I suspect many of the loved ones in my life secretly believe that I'd be better off without him.  Yet most people don't see the Trick that Dave and I see. The cat we adore for his intelligence and smarts, his love and his loyalty. This is the cat I protect, I feed, I love. My kitties bring me great joy. (To read about our furry sociable two-year-old kitty Diego, click here).

The point of this whole thing is: Trick almost died the other day. And I almost completely lost it.

We don't let the cats freely roam here. But we do have a fenced backyard they frequently explore. Little Diego doesn't attempt escape, but Trick does. Unsupervised, he'll be gone in a flash. As was the case the other day. I went into the house for a few minutes to check on dinner. Within minutes, Trick was gone.

I ventured into the neighborhood and quickly spotted Trick exploring a lush hillside directly across the street from our house. I approached him.

Something spooked Trick and he started running. Directly into the street towards the house. Not particularly scary, except at that exact moment a teal Toyota RAV4 was speeding around the corner. The driver must have not been paying much, if any, attention.  The bulbous figure of the 8-month pregnant woman wearing a hot pink tank top in the middle of the street, chasing after her sprinting cat did not cause the driver pause.  My flailing arms did not cause him pause either.

I didn't see the driver brake until the screaming started. My blood-curdling scream cut the air as I watched. With complete horror. My cat go in front of the car. Right in front of the speeding car. I watched him disappear. They met in exactly the same place. Trick didn't just miss the car. The car and my cat met. In the middle of the street.

In that moment. I saw the flash. I saw my cat's limp body splayed on the street. I saw the end of an era. I saw the guilt flood like disease through me. I saw my grief.  I lived that nightmare. Lived in its horror completely. And then the moment passed.

Trick had gone UNDER the car. The car got him head on. BUT it did not squish him or hit him. He went UNDER the front tires and in his furious kitty hurry he made it out the side. Of a moving car. Unharmed. Guided by a divine hand.

I saw Trick, tail ballooned, jump an 8-foot fence in one leap, scrambling over the side back into our yard.

Inside, once we found Trick safely under our bed, Dave told me he heard that horrific scream of mine.  I broke down. I cried for atleast an hour. Convulsing with each vision of that moment. The moment I saw Trick dead. I was so shaken up.

Now it's days later. Trick was weird at first, hiding under the bed. The vet said 'he'll be ok' and gave us some anti-inflammatory and bandages for his paws and some clips for his bloody nails that dug into the pavement and the fence. And he's better now. But sometimes, when I look at him, that vision causes me to shudder.

Mostly, it made me think of being a mother. How I felt so responsible for my cat and how that feeling must be a billion times more intense when you have your own kid. How would I cope with being the person responsible for another person? This person will depend on me TO LIVE. I feel that so strongly with my cats, I realized how much more serious it is going to be as a mother.

I can imagine as a mother towards her child it's over the moon more tangible, more frightening, more gripping than that. How do mothers cope with the fear? The fear of losing something you love that much? I'm scared to imagine that. Scared to feel that. If I feel this towards my cat, how paralyzing will my love for my child be?

making little mes&yous

I met my little boy last night, tucked inside my dreams. He was whisked away after delivery to be cleaned. I waited for an hour to see him. In dream time, probably like one minute. When I saw him, he was everything I thought he'd be: handsome and mine. I was relieved to find I loved him instantly.

In the blurry edges of last night, he was born atleast 6 months old as he could already charm people with his baby kisses. I saw old friends and they oohed and awwed. In my dream everything was All Right. All Right, I beamed.

In real life, I'm about six weeks away from B day. Six weeks. Did you hear that? Six f**king weeks. A blink. Of an eye. My obsession is reaching fever pitch. I wonder/worry/think aloud only pregnancy. Last night at the movies, I worried the volume was too loud for my little one's inner ear. I put a protective extra hand over my belly, hoping the extra layer of skin would dull the bass of the surround sound.

I look at Dave now and can't wait to see him as a Father. A Dad. My Husband. My Life's Love. I am overwhelmed with how much I love him. Last night, as I was a bit sick to my stomach, feeling down and achy, he led me downstairs where it was cooler. He brought me chilled water and a pillow for my belly. The other pillow we shared, head to head, on the green fabric sectional couch. You and me, we formed an L. A Picture of Love. We woke up hours later with the twinkle lights in the trees, yellow on our limbs. You held my arm as we sleep-walked up the stairs.

These moments guarantee that I'll love you forever. When you painted the nursery, I loved you. When you said told me you were sorry that I felt down, I loved you. When you say 'good morning' to my belly, I loved you. The blessings we share do not escape me. Not one day could go by without me counting from one to a zillion why I'm the luckiest girl on earth.  

I am looking forward to enjoying these last few weeks of our aloneness. It's been You and Me for eight great years. And I think I'm going to miss that. In the forever we face as we grow our descendants, I will miss just You and Me. I know the journey is going to be different and amazing and change us in ways we can't imagine and believe you me I'm looking forward to that. It's time. I know that.

But I aim, through all this love and change and making little mes&yous, to keep my eyes on you too. And you keep your eyes on me too, k? Cause in the end, isn't it still just You and Me?

Bullocks to the Third

So pregnancy has been pretty easy on me, I have to admit. I am blessed, I do not deny this. Even so, the third trimester IS the pits. Baby Dax is uber-expanding and I've read that he doubles in size in like the next six weeks. W. T. F.  Sleeping is getting to be a pillow extravaganza. Even my cats have forsaken the bed for the floor.

I had a baby shower in Minnesota last week. It was really lovely. Here's some pics from my trip...

                                                the mobile my sis made for the shower...

Mmm...paper airplane cupcakes...

                                                                      belly shot in red...

I am 33 weeks today, but here's last week's pic...

The Sounds of the Suburbs

So I've been making jokes lately about what yuppie-land we live in here in the green northern canyons of San Diego, where a nice cool breeze ruffles our rose bushes. And then, much to my heart's content, I am typing here at my laptop and I hear an irate neighbor's voice rise through his patio door, "F**k you, f**k you, and f**k YOU." And so on and so forth, voice in a crescendo. His inflections directed with absolute rage at whosoever his targets are. A screen door slams.

And so. Naturally. My two well-groomed cats and I gather at the window peering through the trees, trying to see beyond the clean rattan patio furniture of our neighbor's yard. Shadows skirt the concrete and we hear a woman's voice coaxing her irate male somebody... "Corey...Corey...come in here." She is taming her shaky voice, and my cat lovingly rubs his head under my chin.