Friday

Inside Cats

The cats are introducing me to more people and especially to more children.

The cats act charming, they curl up under the flowering bushes looking graceful and whiskery and they accept praise and worship from us all.

Princess doesn't come out of her bathroom nest very often, but every few days she's restless and wanders around with her characteristic cry which sounds like a hoarse Wowwr!! Wowr. On those days I take her across the road to visit Jos and Mick and to assume her old place on the verandah where she has watched the street go by these last eight years or so.

Not every day. A day out, then two day's rest.

Even though the vet said that her kidneys are remarkably good for a cat her age, she sometimes pees in her bed.  More work for she but Princess still does her cat work, slipping out from her curtained bed, saying hello, lip marking the red shelf in the bathroom, accepting caress and praise, then slipping back to bed.

She's eating well and her arthritic back legs are less shaky than they were a few weeks ago.

She can still leap onto my lap. She can still run nimbly up Jos's front steps although I'm not sure that she still ascends the mulberry tree to get to Jos's roof.

She said she wanted to go out in yesterday's blistering heat. As I carried her past our front gate, she had the energy to hiss at Scrap, who looked  surprised.

Me, I didn't do much at all, a bit of study, a walk to the Post Office to pay bills, some kitchen work and so on.

I collected Princess in the evening. As I chatted with Jos, Sylvio dashed across the road to talk to us. Friday evening's traffic is always dense. Jos and I were frozen with horror. Sylvio timed his run well. I brought him back first. Usually Sylvio, Grace and Stanley are inside by evening time being the first of all the cats to enquire about dinner....

Next time I'll make sure he's in before I cross the road. He's too daring, that small silver boy.

So all are inside and fed except for Greyling. I try to fetch her a few times, but she dances away. 

I go outside to look for her and notice fine drops of rain.

Too tired, too hot to bring the washing in earlier, I get the basket and fetch the washing, not even bothering to fold it.

When I return to our small back yard, the garden is full of silver whiskery faces, mischievous and mysterious.  I'd closed the door without locking it and it must have been Zorro who teased the door open.

They've had their dinner and now they aren't going to come inside, thanks all the same!

I go to get the camera. The pattern of the little faces among the flowering silvery mauve heliotrope and the silver dragon shapes of the artichoke is lovely. They are all in the wilderness by the time I return to the garden and No, when I call, they will not come.

I give up and go inside.

The rain gradually gets heavier and pretty soon there are faces at the kitchen window.

"Can we come inside now please?"

"Oh, all right," she growls.

But Lucibelle and Balanchine didn't escape. They knew the rain to be on its way.

She Sings

Three Green Men

In the beginning of this blog, I mention that I've studied dreams for many years.

I include a recent dream here because the cats are present and also eventually, it includes She, (the cat’s ‘mother’).

(As a youngster, I decided to write out my dreams in order to disprove Jungian Theory.)

I gave up on certain disputations in my mid twenties although the habit of recording dreams remained. Looking at the underworld helps us understand the world above, (the dream world of course, being a weird and surreal looking glass reality). 

That’s what I conclude after three decades of keeping such records as explicated by my subconscious and the subconscious of many people who've shared their dreams with me at different times.

This is from a few days ago: 

Me and Rex the Ex are at SBS. (Sydney’s Multicultural Media Channel with whom Rex and me at one stage had much trouble in terms of a Voluntary Project). 

SBS is exactly as I saw it back then, a collection of warring shanties after the move of Radio from Bondi Junction, who had somewhat helped us, to the new site at Artarmon over on the north side of Sydney.

Me and Rex, we had to sleep there. There was a sort of soft surface room and a few blankets which we had to divide among many diverse people.

I'm so tired that I look for a blanket and find a spot as quick as I can. Then Rex the Ex says,

"Oh no, there are cockroaches in this blanket," and I say, 

“So What?" (I am that tired.)

He pulls it away, saying, 

"We will not sleep here!"

OK, the room is full of people about to bed down. Among them I see iconic sports commentators, Rampaging Roy Slaven and HG Nelson. They're OK, they are dealing with the madnesses and eventually they go somewhere else.

Rex finds a good blanket and at last we sleep, lying crosswise from the spot that Roy and HG had recently slept.

It’s a clean blanket and a good sleep.

The next morning we wake and there are things to sort out. I'm doing the business as I did back then and I travel through various Departments. At one time I discover people discussing Our Project (which in the Wake World came to naught). They're saying,

"If they don’t work with us, they will work their project through the ABC!" 

(The ABC being Australia’s Other Public Broadcaster.)

They're being very disparaging about us. 

It's time to gather our energies.

There are an awful lot of cats outside in this hilly countryside region. I recognise my little cats with whom I'm living at present.

There are people there who are clothed in the aura of Religion saying that all the cats must be killed.

"No way", I say.

Rex and I have a very nice new white van.

I collect all my little ones (which is a very complicated process).

You know how it is, you put one cat in the van and another escapes, and so on, but eventually all our cats are inside and we set out.

There’s a phase where we're going through a tricky part of the road, quite deadly. A narrow path, and it seems that there are spikes on the railing beside the road. As a driver, I look at these spikes more closely. They are little iron horses. Suddenly, I'm by myself, working my way down spiral staircases and various narrow opportunities to get to the road. I clutch an iron peg to help me descend at one point.

I cling to bits of iron to help that descent. Somehow I’m not separated from our van because that's how realities can go in that instance.

Rex is still in the passenger seat and all the cats are with us and suddenly it eases up so that we're driving along the highway and I'm singing a song whose major lyrics are She Says, She Says, She says, and we are going very good.

WOW

So busy at this time with many many things.

The tutoring work is in the foundation phase here.

I've got the new card thanks to Anna.

(Much cheaper than when I first got the camera.)

We all hang on the weather.

A recent stinking hot day, a chilly change.

Then a warm day with marbled cloud.

With kids in the place I took Princess across the road this morning.

We went to the park, returning when the thick clouds came.

A long walk & I rested while Lucy slept.

Lucy is a little gal who's visiting lately with her big sister Mina.

I'm so glad that I have kids in my life again.

When I returned to the upright world after my rest, it was freezing cold.

I picked up Princess, she was trembling, shuddering, poor old gal.

She's had her tucker, she's had her medicine and now she's warm again.