'Pinned', by 'Black Cats'

Only sat down to have lunch, on 'blog day', and have been surrounded by 'black cats' ever since (and before, in different ways).  Got some work done.  Still can't get up.  Still working.  One in my lap, one on the right, another foster cat on the left.  Because I sat down.  Not their normal napping spots.  Must be the body heat, as if they needed to get warm, indoors, with a person who keeps the thermostat higher than most.




They have been sequestered until the passing of a 'holiday' that has had them at risk.  Today's.  Same day 18 years ago I informed my son's father a child was on the way: the telling being an utterance I have often regretted.  Otherwise, however, the child would have never known his father's side of the family (most of whom are not abusive), and I would have been able to afford the child's college education: material for another story altogether.




Cruelty is mostly human to human and human to animal, animals killing humans usually only when threatened and not killed by humans first.  Animals with black fur are even more vulnerable on Halloween, thus you rarely see them at adoption events or featured in shelters during the month of October.  The kittens that have taken over my lap for the afternoon are no exception.  They will be made available next month, 'Lord willing'. 




Two siblings from a litter of four, one that didn't survive.  The remaining three would have been put down because there was no overnight staff at a kill shelter to bottle feed them.  It was only a matter of timing and proximity that death was not their fate.  Not all are so lucky.  Same goes for unweaned puppies.




So it's ironic they must remain protected once again, from people cognitively aware they are from a rescue, not caring they were spared with intentions to make them victims of sadistic pranks that are actually crimes for which they will likely as not be held accountable.




The same logic applies to the abusers of humans, the difference being that accountability is even less.  More animal shelters exist than refuge for survivors of domestic violence and their children.  They are most always women and minors.  The stories and their atrocities are seen less in the news than those of animal cruelty, yet no less prevalent.




Black cats (or animals) are not 'bad luck', or appropriate targets of cruelty.  Neither are women and children.  The media has hidden the facts rather than expose them much more often than not.  Following the money is one explanation, the culture of people (and animals) as property with which 'owners' can 'do as they wish' is another.  Not so ironically, the U.S. Constitution supports it.  Will let that sink in, 'til another time (Lord willing).




Black cats get bad treatment, as do donkeys, elephants, dogs, and pigs.  All are gentle creatures deserving of compassion and kindness, yet they have been made to symbolize 'terror', political parties, sexual perversion and depravity, and a host of other connotations none of them deserve either. 




The same could easily be said for mothers attempting to protect their children who use systemic means of last resort only to find themselves up for auction and slaughter as well.  The parallels, and extent to which the cultural conditioning contributes to the massacres remains mind boggling.

Anniversary, Again

He called tonight, the one who was big news sixteen years ago.  A life changing surprise.  He didn't know I had tried to call before; he didn't know how to access the voicemail from a land line.  It wasn't his phone.  His had been taken away for a time.  He should have been here; hearing his voice from his call was the next best thing, and not a short conversation either.  It was quality, among many that simply couldn't be, and too many that have been an inappropriate 'replacement' for not being together.

I took a walk per doctor's orders, as other families and children observed the holiday.  It didn't make me feel any worse; I just wish my son could have seen it. 

I don't remember going so long without working, though I have in the past.  Looking for work is a job of itself, with no compensation for the duration.  It's harder recovering from life-saving surgery; being alive now has a different meaning.  It would have been a slow deterioration otherwise. 

Today I was able to get up onto a chair and change light bulbs in a ceiling fixture, after trying weeks before and not being able to get up on the chair for fear of falling and not being strong enough.  Today I can turn on the light again and not have to use a smaller one in a corner, after several weeks.

Still not feeling strong enough for many things, though eventually more strength will return.  Walking more upright, a little taller, and more stable.  It was the best possible outcome, that came with high risk; the alternative would not have rendered a quality of life to fulfill what had been started.  Preparation was required in advance.  Life before was much about preparation, having no idea what would be on the other side.  As it got closer to the day it was very difficult; only family made it bearable.  Hearing my son's voice was healing of itself, yet still lacking.  I couldn't dwell on it, for him; I simply had to pull through: a metaphor from the past, for the future.  I don't remember if I told him about the anniversary; I think I did, wondering if he remembered, too, without making it a topic of conversation, for a reason connected to why he's not here, now.

Howloween Sandy

We interrupt our regularly scheduled family history installment for a breaking story on Hurricane Sandy. I’m in a high school gym, that I’ve only been to previously for work. Now I’m on a cot. I’m told our apartment is dry, though it’s inaccessible until the lake that was the street returns to an inroad instead of a river. Everyone on the other side is stranded, unless they have an emergency, where police and the fire department have been getting some across in boats. I went back twice, with the only result being my taking five people, two dogs and one rabbit, who had spent the night in a dark, cold, wet terror to the evacuation center I’d come from and friends’ houses.

Some lost everything. There are no stores or outlets to travel out from the other side. Those who remain are on higher ground that we hope have stocked up for the duration. They have electricity, with most of their cars and homes intact. Some were not so lucky; some were rescued from roofs or upper floors in wet clothes. They were where the streets were lower. Was on the phone with my child who had called for an update at the same time I had walked a couple of blocks later in the day to see if either the water had gone down or if I could get across. The answer was priority boat assisted evacuation only.

It was understandable. If I were to be taken across, this wasn’t a 24/7 water taxi service. Work was to be attended the next day. I would have likely ended up stranded come the next morning, unable to leave, our car that survived the storm as I’d heeded the evacuation warning parked on the side of civilization. Close, yet not an option to swim to if the water had not gone down much or the emergency crews were not available.

Scores of years since the last flood of this magnitude, in this part of the country, maybe even a century. The trauma hasn’t hit me yet, though we were among the lucky. For what it kicks up regarding past experiences brings everything back. Including the residual trauma. Had we been able to leave, closer to family when the time was appropriate, we would not be here at all. The hurricane didn’t go there.

With one exception, another single mom with a daughter my child's age who happens to be an accountant, I didn't know the names of any of them. When the dogs' names were spoken, being at each other in a small car, the names left my memory as soon as they were uttered. We were and are all still recovering from a temporary displacement with deep emotional reverberations. I empathized with the thirst of days without food or water, still not knowing for certain what I would be going back to myself.

Everything that day was on a moment to moment basis, and is somewhat the same today, Halloween: another anniversary when my first and only child's conception was announced six weeks into the first trimester. Every day was almost dreamily surreal then: the shock of carrying a child after I'd given up it was even possible. Now that child is reportedly carrying a pillowcase to collect candy he'll likely give away or will not be consumed; it's all just too much, as are the secrets for now, though the desire to participate overshadows any trepidation.

The mall is filled with costumed children that are hard to look at for the memories that are stirred: the innocent face looking up in anticipation for the plastic pumpkin to be filled, store to store in the old neighborhood, brimming over before the children's parade began. The candy that would never be finished, again, in a way just as well, though the feelings that have accompanied since have been so unnecessary.

The lightness of childhood became heavier, a grain of sand at a time, until they became virtual sandbags to a young psyche. Life is now emptying the sandbox, a scoop at a time (sometimes a pinch, sometimes a teaspoon), so that not fully grown toes can dig themselves in, and remember all the happy thoughts, without guilt that was never theirs from when it began, imposed and accepted, as children do.

Here's to no longer longingly gazing at an animal wished to be their own, for it will be, and the sandbox, and the complimenting Howloween costume, the pair will be the toast of their own parade, with more smiles returning. Sandy the hurricane is just a bump in the road by comparison. The storm in this life so far is the interim between one anniversary and the one that makes up for all of the others, during a childhood.

Anniversary

Looked in other posts for this same month for the life of this blog; it has to have been mentioned before, though not necessarily.

On this day twelve years ago someone else was told besides my mother a child was on the way. A blessing, a gift, an intervention.

That child is out for the holiday tonight, dressed as Homer Simpson. The temperature is only slightly cooler than the night was when the announcement of his upcoming birth was made. It seems like a long time ago, though some feelings are like yesterday.

He is the inspiration for everything now, having given life a new purpose just by existing. His personality and natural gifts are still developing, yet already he's exceptional, and not just because of who he became the child of.

It was in another post my inability to speak when he made one of the most profound statements I've ever heard to the effect that no matter who or when he was born to, he would have been the child I had, regardless of when, how, or with whom.

He probably doesn't remember saying that now, though I will remind him. I'm not sure he realized what he was saying then, or where it was coming from. He's too far away now, geographically that is. It can't last long. It has tested our bond, yet more of concern are the realities of the way things have been that do not recognize why there has been so much that's presently not only unnatural. It's a test of strength and nature, imposed by flawed humans blind to all but potential profit.

Children are not commodities, yet they're traded every day with no regard to what may be imposed or await; how it affects the child and family irreversibly under even bearable circumstances, as if there was such a thing when profit trumps human life. It happens in this country in less obvious ways than the media allows common households to see.

So every year when this day rolls around is bittersweet. What happened within the week after the announcement, and in the years that followed have taken more than one life in a completely different direction. The child has not been the centerpoint, or there would be more health, peace, and sense of family, for everyone involved.

Entitlement and conditioning blinds some that others exist that their decisions and arrogance affect, which cannot last. Elitism that what one must have or control above all else and at the expense of others also goes against nature and must diminish and bring to the forefront those they have sought to diminish, in the short term, only for nature to eventually bring the lesson around at some point. A childhood cannot be lost from the simple will and domino effect of poor intentions and incentives.

This would not be wished on an enemy. Part of the purpose is to bring it to light, so that other lives will not be bartered, sold, or diminished.

The child remains the light, with a soul that's true, a representation for what comes next: their legacy. In the tradition and by the example of those he is familiar with yet hasn't met, his life will continue the legacy of those who existed so that his life would be richer and that he remains strong.

Another day in another year, each irreplaceable, each significant, each a holiday, as is every day he laughs, smiles, and understands his own definition of love as it evolves with time, experience, and exposure to everything his life will touch.