The best remedy for a long day? Cat time.
The Cat
In my house is a one-eyed cat
Poised for luck on a windowsill
Her remaining eye is cataract clouded
Clarity lost in a dark instant
A distant wound salvaged
By surgery, her blind futures averted
She is pure patience perched
On a shadowed brink of world
Blurred by screen and mystery
Unaware of her own tragedy
Unruffled, the cat is vigilant
Staring down lawn with one imperfect eye
Lest light slip past her window
Tragically unobserved
The woods of my youth grew complete with creek and wildlife. I knew every nest, den, and footprint. In summer briars, snakes, and mosquitoes swarmed into the woods. In winter they retreated, surrendering a fey, brittle place where I got lost for hours without ever getting lost. Escorted by a pack of dogs, sometimes by the bravest of our cats, I chased over and around and through the creek, straggling home at dusk muddy and matted with burrs.
In early spring lamprey came to spawn. I gloated over the lamprey, certain they lived nowhere else of consequence. Each March I knelt for hours beside the shallows where they dug their nests. I counted them and marveled at their spots and stripes. I cupped my hands under them and watched them wiggle free over my fingers.
I’m sure I did other things, had other habits and hobbies. But my memory is overgrown, buried in underbrush and fallen leaves, forever snarled in the woods. Should I return now, I don’t believe I’d find my woods. Only a few acres of trees and a little stream.
So where does my nostalgia lead? Not back into the woods. But spending time with these pictures feels like an invaluable luxury in my busy world of adult anxieties.
I wrote this piece a few years ago. I’m reposting it now because these pictures have been calling to me. They are more than shadow and light, more than pixels. They rustle like leaves and smell like wet, happy dogs. (All four dogs are long passed and well grieved.) I can almost taste the crisp air from that misty day in 1992, a rare elixir of youth and solitude and happiness. Perhaps, despite my earlier claim, this nostalgia DOES lead back into the woods.
From my earliest memory I lived among packs, herds, and flocks. Not all of the pets belonged to me. Each was designated an “owner” within the family, for the sake of clarity…and blame. So that when my sister’s Husky chewed another plug off another cord, the destruction belonged to my sister. When one of my cats clawed another hole in another screen, or delivered kittens on Daddy’s coat, the trouble was mine. (Though Mother shielded us from the worst storms. I don’t believe Daddy ever knew about his coat.)
We chose some of our pets, others chose us. For the most part, once they set toe on our property, they stayed. Every nook and cranny, every shed and tree sheltered our teeming beasts. I can’t imagine a world not crowded with warm, funny companions. We fed and housed them, and in return they taught us to laugh and cry with their wonderful, infuriating habits. Despite the semantics of ownership, I now claim them all. I own a story for each of them. They are in everything I do.
Over the last few weeks I have come to know Mother’s current cats, four rescued felines with wildly different personalities. They range from shy to bold…from chronically sleepy to intensely curious. I’m delighted to know them, to add their characters to The Menagerie’s story.
Rae Spencer 