AMUSED

Before Cleopatra came into my life I had never actually had my own pet. When I was a kid we always had a dog and a cat or two, but they were family pets. Even my previous cat Imp never felt like she was really “MY” cat. When I got Imp I had a roomate who worked from home. She spent more time with Imp when she was a kitten than I did and Imp was as much her cat as mine.
Getting a cat was nowhere of my spectrum of things to do when I drove by a house that had a sign out front that they had free kittens. I stopped just to take a look cause kittens are cute. By the time I stopped all of the kittens had been adopted to good homes except for the supposed runt, who the foster mother had temporally named Ladybug. The foster mother did not object to me “just looking” at the kitten. We chatted a bit while Ladybug wobbled up onto my leg and climbed onto my shoulder. I was in love. I could not bear to go home without this creature that seemed all big green eyes and ears.
I was unpreapared and did not have a box or carrier to take a kitten home in….I had a laundry basket but that didnt work very well. I had to stop at Zellers enroute. I had nothing at home, no litter box, no litter, no cat food, no toys. Typically I am not the type of person who can “pop” into any store. I have to look around, see what is on sale, compare prices, and go from store to store, before I make a purchase….but on this trip I was in and out of Zellers in less than 10 minutes, and this was a the August long weekend. I had to get back to my baby.

I spent the rest of the weekend mesmerized by her. I hated being separated from her to go to work when the weekend was over. Comming home in the evening, she was so happy to see me, made it clear that she loved me too. That did not change over the next 12 years. I grew a bit thicker through the middle, grew some grey hairs. Cleo grew into a big lazy fat antisocial cat. We added Sooty to our family who Cleopatra never came to like, We moved from our apartment to our house and within a year Lily was added to out family. Lily came to me alot like Cleo did. I just wanted to meet the Bunny that was free to a good home. I really did not intend to take her home with me. But I fell in love with the sweet bunny. Cleo was indifferent to Lily (somewhat better to her total distain of Sooty) unfortunatly Lily liked Cleo, and Sooty, but neither one of them would give her the time of day. That was why Mister came into the picture. That worked out wonderfully. Lily and Mister loved one another. But Cleo never created any bonds with anybody but me. I would have liked it she had of been the type of cat who would have been all over people when they came to visit and rubbed up against tpetting and chin rubs. But when the doorbell rang she would run up the stairs, white belly of waddle waddling to and fro. But when I walked into a room she would always look to me with those big green eyes and I would know that she loved me. She would start purring when I would speak her name. If I was to tired to give her a good petting before I fell asleep she would still purr on the other side of the bed when I would put my hand on her fur. On Saturday of last week I was putting away laundry. Cleo was on the end of the bed and she looked like she was purring. But when I came close to her I realized that she was breathing deeply. This continued for the rest of the day. I got up on Sunday morning to take her to the vet but our vet was closed on Sunday. Her condition had not changed, I watched here closly and first thing Monday I took her to the clinic. The Vet did a physical examination and determined that either her respitory system or her heart was failing. Tests and treatement would clarify the situaction but the outcome was still going to be the same…..I was going to have to say goodby to my beloved Cleo. I did not want her to suffer and my vet gave me the numbers of some vets who would come to my house and to send Cleo to her final sleep while in the comfort of her home. For the time being it seemed to me that she was tired and weak but not in pain. She still would look up at me when I came into the room and purr when I petted her. As long as this continued I was going to take every moment that we had together. On Wednesday the weariness seemed to be overwhelming her and I resolved to make the call the next day. At 11:45 she meowed loudly and I came to her….I held her head and petted her and she passed away.I cried…..some more (I have been crying off and on all week), and I will continue to cry more. Sometimes I think I am doing okay….I had to take her remains to the vet. I thought it would just be a formality, but I was a blubbering mess. There will be more tears I know but this heartbreak is because I had a wonderful beautiful cat. I love her dearly and know that she loved me. And that is the important thing about Cleo.

How many times have you found yourself speaking of a same sex couple and saying  “not that there is anything wrong with that”  refering to the quote from the Seinfiend sitcom?

He also did a speil about how kids have friends the minute they walk out the front door and find other kids…..adults on the other hand……dont make friends so easily. 

A friend ( a much respected NEW friend) of mine, transfered to Toronto from Edmonton a few months ago, with only high school chums, and work contacts as a starting point for starting a whole new social network.  She joined the Running Room and the Curling club and got to know new people that (some who were only names on a distribution list at work).  She met friends of friends (me).  She found things to do and places to go and people to see.    In  a few months she has built herself a pretty cool life with an an amazing veiw over Lake Ontario.

I on the other hand am at the same job for going on +10 years, the my house (with equity I keep telling myself) has come to feel like an money pit, and the people that I meet when I step out the front door have been known to call the cops on me when I have left the radio on after 11:00pm.  I long for those idelic days when I would show up at the sledding hill and whoever was there would be my best friend. 

Not to say that I dont have some great friends.  I do but there are days when new conversation would be a stimulating change.  Maybe I need to move.  LOL NEVER!!!!

In my house, the list of Reno projects is a long one.  After the first year or two of home ownership, I have kinda got complacent about some of them.  My kitchen and my bathroom both need such major demos that I have just ignored them figuring  that because I don’t have the budget to do it right so I wont do it at all.   But in order to keep sloth from completely enveloping my life, fate sometimes intervenes.  This time fate entered the minds of the termites that nibbled on the porch that was built off of my kitchen.

After the exterminators were done I called in a handyman to fix the damage of my ugly porch.  I am paraphrasing but he basically said “if it is ugly why not just tear it down” to which I replied “I just spent over $1000.00 having the roof fixed and it adds square footage to my property value”  he responded “I can keep your roof and your square footage and get rid of the rest, providing a view to the backyard and no more ugly”.  My end of the deal is that I have to dig up the raspberry bush, go to Home Depot, buy a Rubbermaid shed, Assemble said shed, move all the crap from the porch to the shed, and then VOILA…..thehandymandan comes in. Knocks out the walls puts in a nice ceiling some lighting and a deck and all of a sudden I have a nice backyard to look into from my kitchen (the shed assembly while not easy has an end result that went well). 

It seems silly typing this, but I really enjoy standing at the kitchen counter in the morning, pouring my morning coffee and enjoying a view of….not closed curtains or a shelf of garden tools….but the serenity of my backyard with my nice new shed, the skeletal frame of my plane tree (I name her Plane Jane) and the lilac bushes (severely pruned by my brother, who is forgiven because he help assemble the shed) and the occasional neighborhood Tom Cat coming around to visit my (spayed) girls.  Only to be hissed and spat at from the other side of the glass doors. Thehandymandan has changed my life, not only in the value of not only my porch but of my kitchen. I suddenly LIKE being there.  (Except for the crazy color scheme)

Aside from thehandymandan, I also had the windows in the house replaced.  I admit that I was manipulated by the government of Canada promise of a tax rebate to do this, but once I had a new patio door looking out onto the backyard it became apparent to me that it was time to….PAINT THE KITCHEN.  The previous coat of paint was induced by a weekend marathon of Trading Spaces which ended with red diamonds painted on a background of a yellow that can only be compared to rain boots.  The only change in color selection that I have done since then has been in the living room where I chose the colors of diaper contents baby crap green with baby crab yellow accent. (Which after two years I still like).  The kitchen is off the living room so I headed off to Home Depot to look at paint chips in the baby crap blue tones.   Ends up babies don’t crap blue.  But for some reason I had my heart set on blue (scary cause I vaguely remember having my “heart set” on yellow before the rain slicker yellow of the last time that I did this) 

Moving on… I was smitten with blue in the “casual” chip.  After painting one wall I remembered that I had watched The Handmaidens Tale on TV the night before and was wondering if that had influenced my decision.  Was my kitchen going to look like “serenity now” or worse  a nursery for a baby boy?   Humm even so it was better than the “Trading Places” mess….I moved on.     

Painting always takes longer than it should.  A week later the paint is done, the “cucumber green” accent takes away from the nursery look, the new curtain finial and the white draping curtains over the patio doors give a “soft” look. (I have not given up on the designing TV shows).  I have replaced the old ugly ceiling tiles with new ugly ceiling tiles.  In a last minute ditch I ran out to Canadian Tire on Jan 31 and bought a new ceiling fan (receipt available for revenue canada). 

When I removed the existing light fixture I found that (yet again) the guy that lived here before me did a lot of his own home Reno’s and they are not to code.  I am waiting for an electrician to come in and fix up the wiring an install the ceiling fan.  *sigh*.  Also in the painting I realized that BIG ugly in the kitchen is that the cupboards need to be painted (I have some vacation coming in March).  But aside from living in the semi dark while waiting for an electrician and semi sanded cupboards., the kitchen is done….for now and I can get back to blogging….and other important things (like calling India to fix my router so I can add pics of my semi new kitchen)

Later

D

This time last year I was attempting to lure the object of my lust back to me from his Christmas vacation.   Promises of unbridled passion only succeeded in making me more aware of how futile and stupid I was allowing myself be about the said object of my lust.   The longer we continued to spend time together the more I would become aware that the things that were desirable about our arrangement were the same things that made it fundamentally wrong. 

 I was liking the fact that I never had to make breakfast, never had to deal with someone wanting to know where I was or what I was doing 7/24, never had to hear the same rants about the same issues over and over again.  He never spent the night, never asked what I did when he was not around, and he was always so “busy” that when we managed to have time to spend together it was not wasted on idle chit chat.  These  “good” things were counterbalanced with the knowledge that I had his cell number and email address to keep in touch but not his home number, that I never seen him on weekends, and that some unfortunate incident always intervened when we would meet socially in a company of our mutual acquaintances.  This had been occurring for well over a year and I was finding it harder to ignore that his  roommate (who he adamantly assured me was not his wife) was something much more than a roommate. 

 But I digress, at this time last year I was feeling frustrated and unfulfilled, so I ended up spending New Years Eve at a “singles” event, where I received the adulation of smelly  men who sprayed when they spoke, ….into my chest.  An event that I returned from wishing even more than before for the company of  the object of my lust.

 While the object of my lust had caused  some distress over the course of 2008 he also provided a distraction from a turmoil at work.  It was a year with the promise of cutbacks and layoffs.  The mortgage, the taxes, the utilities, the day to day cost of living was within my means so long as my  employment…..well continued.  In the spring my brother married his love of many years, in the Caribbean.  I must confess that it left me bewildered as to why the fates have seemed to deprive me of a happy union and provided me with only an ofttimes attainable object to lust.  It felt wrong on such a happy occasion to feel unhappy, but I was.  When I returned home I sought a distraction from the overwhelming fact of my spinsterhood and there was the object of my lust to provide that distraction.

Shortly after my return my beloved  pet appeared to be limping.  His regular vet refered him to a specialised clinic. My worst fear was a dislocated leg.  Sometimes life can be even worse that your imagine.  He had cancer in the bone of his hind leg.   While this was more horrible news than I could imagine I was committed to surgery and rehabilitation would allow him to live happily with me for more years with three legs.  For weeks he and I struggled to develop his new life but he did not recuperate and after a million tears I had to accept that he was better off leaving this world. 

 In spite of my grief , day to day life went on.  With its ups and downs, and with the car in front of me stopping unexpectedly,  resulting in the end of my paid for car, and a nasty ticket that ended up dragging on for ages because I was convinced to fight the charge.  The cost to fight it were more than the ticket, but my driving record was somewhat reprieved.  The cost of a decent replacement car incured a loan that will carry on for another year at least.

 By the end of 2008 I  was heartbroken, staggering with financial hardship, missing the fellowship of friends who had been removed from our place of employment, and missing the company of someone who I was pretty sure was spending Christmas with someone who matters more to him than I ever will. 

I was happy to put that year behind me, figuring 2009 could only be better.  Until March, when my father died, Until April when the cruelty of my sisters conviction of salvation and damnation cut her from my heart, until June when another beloved pet died, until August when the object of my lust moved away, until November when I cannot bear my disappointment in my brother any longer.  Now I realize I was wrong 2009 was much worse than 2008…..dare I tempt the gods by hoping that the comming year can only be better?