Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Spring

This past weekend I had a little getaway to New Hope, PA. Ok, it might not sound like the hottest vacation spot in the world, but it's a great place to stay for a couple of nights while catching up with friends. Great places to eat, comfy B&B's, minimal driving required during your stay.

Which is great if you do the kind of drinking that I do while vacationing.

And the eating! Dear Lord, Eggs Benedict is a hearty dish for someone who mostly eats yogurt, chicken, fruit, and salad these days. With the occasion KFC drumstick thrown in for good measure. I was not prepared for the price I had to pay for hollandaise sauce. But it was perfect. It tasted so good.

Most of the food was excellent, the wineries were comically horrible, and the massage was to die for. Literally. My massage therapist worked the ever-loving-shit out of my left trapezius and neck that it actually made me cry. No, not in pain, but in the dear-God-you-are-releasing-4-or-5 -years-of-anxiety-sadness-and-assorted-atrocities-variety. Unbelievable.

Seriously folks, I worked out some longstanding mental ISSUES while this fine lady went ape shit on that part of my body. So much forgiveness for the things in life that I have been angry about occurred during that session, it would be too much to tell. But I wanted to document it here and remember it always. And as soon as I feel this part of my body acting up again, I will RUN to the next available massage therapist and we will work it out again.

And speaking of forgiveness and working it out, I have decided to delete a few of my older postings and go somewhat public with this blog again. All of my OG readers can just remember in their minds, if they want and/or can, things written here before. Thank you for reading some of that ugliness. Your comments were very supportive and I appreciate it. I don't believe in changing the past but sometimes personal history can do with a bit of erasure. Especially when it's on the Internet :-P

Anyway, this is a new era, one in which I do not stand by, foot on the clutch, idling. The world can be my oyster if I allow it to be. I am thankful for the good experiences, attitudes, and people that have come my way.

Saturday, May 16, 2009

Kittens and Things

Things have calmed down in my life considerably. I think this has a lot to do with not drinking coffee anymore. I had a cup or two last Sunday after attending an awesome party which involved a bit of drinking the night before.

In case you were wondering, there was no driving involved. There was, however, a shuttle bus which took us back to a hotel where everyone was able to safely sleep it off in safety and dine on eggs and bacon the next morning. And that's when I had a little bit of coffee, but for a week before and ever since then, there has been none.

I can tell you right now that I will never be a coffee Nazi. I can only say from my own personal experience that the change has been profound. I do drink a cup of tea in the morning, black tea which has caffeine. I am told that this has just as much or possibly more caffeine than coffee, ounce for ounce, but I just feel DIFFERENT. My anxiety is minimal, my thoughts don't race nearly as much, my concentration is OK, and I just feel a hell of lot more in control of my impulses.

Who cares about that when there is a kitten in the house?!

His name is Lucius and Sadie snuck him home last Sunday night despite my protests to her pleas over last weekend. As of this writing he is seven weeks old and I love him. He's a grey, tiger-striped bundle of joy with 4 white paws. His eyes are yellowish-green.

When she first found him he was on the side corner of Main Street Lodi and Route 46, tucked up into a guard rail on the exit ramp. He was dirty and terrified, with eyes crusted shut with pus. His belly was hard and bloated and his limbs were skinny. She gave him a few baths over the weekend while I was dancing the night away and possibly making a fool of myself among people I hardly knew but who seemed to like me just the way I was. The kitten I thought I had swiftly rejected was far from my mind but being tended to in the most loving manner possible but my own child.

Her decision to disobey direct orders is probably going to go down in history as the one that makes me proudest.

While getting ready for our day on Monday morning I heard a distinct meow come from her room. We were in the hallway by the bathroom together and I looked at her and she looked at me and she tried to deny the fact that there was a cat in the house but the writing was on the wall. She broke down and begged me to keep him, to just take a look at him, wanting to tell me the story but we were all too busy to get into it right then and there. I told her he was going to the shelter that evening, listing all of the reasons why we cannot keep a cat in this house.

On the drive to work, I started to think that maybe a shelter wasn't the best idea. They are over-loaded with cats just like this one. I have a tremendous amount of respect for animal shelters and what they do and I started to think that maybe, just maybe, we could lighten that load by one cat and take care of matters ourselves. I found myself dialing our vet and before I knew it we had an appointment that evening.

We don't live in a palace, but we do have a little bit of room that can be dedicated for the kitten before he gets too big. We are not millionaires, but there is enough room in the budget to get this guy his shots and get him neutered. We are all busy, but not so busy that we can't take a little bit of time out of each day to make sure that he's played with and feels love.

We already have a few potential placements for him and one in particular feels like it's really going to work but they aren't sure if neutering is in their budget right now. I have told these people that I will absolutely cover the costs of neutering if they want to bring him into their home. I am prepared for this and I really wouldn't have it any other way.

I can't help but feel very good about what we are doing. We took in an animal that would have, in the best of circumstances, become just another feral cat-diseased, malnourished, populating the area with more and more feral cats. Instead, he is now well-fed, playful, attended to medically, and not going to reproduce. Again, my pride in Sadie for over-riding my decision is great, and I am humbled by her wisdom.

Lucius means "bringer of light." Our home has been a lot brighter since his entrance into our lives. Lord knows, judging by the last handful of posts, I was looking for the light in all the wrong places. I feel like the light found me.