.
Although you hide in the ebb and flow
Of the pale tide when the moon has set,
The people of coming days will know
About the casting out of my net,
And how you have leaped times out of mind
Over the little silver cords,
And think that you were hard and unkind,
And blame you with many bitter words.
--William Butler Yeats
Showing posts with label Series Pets. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Series Pets. Show all posts
April #4, Frogs
I find a tadpole in a stagnant pool. There are others too. They are pea-sized. My shadow momentarily protects their habitat from the blazing sunlight. They pretend not to see me. Now I see hundreds in the shallow water, but I only take the one. I put him in a fishbowl.
I don't know what tadpoles eat, or if they eat at all. Weeks pass and the small wiggler grows legs, then arms. He stops wiggling and climbs out of the water, his body now almond-sized.
I do know that frogs eat flies, and that frogs need to eat.
There is a fly in the living room right now. I've never seen a frog eat a smashed fly, so I try to catch it alive. I'm unsuccessful. However, a whip from a kitchen towel brings down the fly. I scoop it up and drop it in the fish bowl.
Confirming my earlier suspicion, frogs don't eat smashed flies.
Then the fly revives! It must have been stunned, not dead; not for long. The tiny frog attacks the fly with his tongue in a split-second, then swallows. The frog is satisfied, and I am a satisfied master.
Looming behind my grinning face is the fear of having to regularly provide for him. His meal was the product of my luck and his instinct, and I can control neither.
So, my green friend takes a bike ride with me back to his green tadpole pond. The fishbowl, the bicycle, and I are still alien to this place. Again my shadow covers the entire habitat. I release him to the wild, doubting his survival and hoping I haven't crippled him.
I don't know what tadpoles eat, or if they eat at all. Weeks pass and the small wiggler grows legs, then arms. He stops wiggling and climbs out of the water, his body now almond-sized.
I do know that frogs eat flies, and that frogs need to eat.
There is a fly in the living room right now. I've never seen a frog eat a smashed fly, so I try to catch it alive. I'm unsuccessful. However, a whip from a kitchen towel brings down the fly. I scoop it up and drop it in the fish bowl.
Confirming my earlier suspicion, frogs don't eat smashed flies.
Then the fly revives! It must have been stunned, not dead; not for long. The tiny frog attacks the fly with his tongue in a split-second, then swallows. The frog is satisfied, and I am a satisfied master.
Looming behind my grinning face is the fear of having to regularly provide for him. His meal was the product of my luck and his instinct, and I can control neither.
So, my green friend takes a bike ride with me back to his green tadpole pond. The fishbowl, the bicycle, and I are still alien to this place. Again my shadow covers the entire habitat. I release him to the wild, doubting his survival and hoping I haven't crippled him.
March #3, Pigeons
The graceless air rats called pigeons are the embarassing cousings from the Columbidae family. Nature confusingly prefers these animals to others by endowing them with the ability to fly and with a bonus feature of inextinctability.
My most heated pigeon dilemma occured in a tall building which had a residential unit on the top floor. Because the building was still in construction, this top floor residential unit was nothing but four walls of windows. The unfortunate pigeon found its way into the construction site but couldn't find its way out.
I attempted to frighten the pigeon out the door. It wanted to escape--as evidenced by multiple pigeons-shaped dust marks scattered about random windows--but had accepted the fact that it was trapped.
Because it wouldn't cooperate, it was my duty to slay the beast. I don't habitually kill things. Even detestable spiders find themselves led out of my house unharmed. (Unless I ever find those big brown fuzzy ones. Those I vengefully kill instantly even if it means using my bare hands or feet.)
My most heated pigeon dilemma occured in a tall building which had a residential unit on the top floor. Because the building was still in construction, this top floor residential unit was nothing but four walls of windows. The unfortunate pigeon found its way into the construction site but couldn't find its way out.
I attempted to frighten the pigeon out the door. It wanted to escape--as evidenced by multiple pigeons-shaped dust marks scattered about random windows--but had accepted the fact that it was trapped.
Because it wouldn't cooperate, it was my duty to slay the beast. I don't habitually kill things. Even detestable spiders find themselves led out of my house unharmed. (Unless I ever find those big brown fuzzy ones. Those I vengefully kill instantly even if it means using my bare hands or feet.)
The act was difficult. I had to recruit one of the office workers to help me. He would chase the pigeon towards me while I waited with a broomstick and adrenaline. The process continued for over an hour, and I believe the bird had a good understanding of the threat for at least the last 55 minutes. The broomstick finally made contact. It only took once. The lump on the cold cement floor was my answer to Nature's preference.
March #2, Cats
I heard the worst details about our neighborhood cats from a stranger on the other side of the world.
I heard the details while I sat in a large English dining room lit only by natural afternoon sunlight shining in from bay windows, which provided pleasant lakeside views. Apart from the bay windows, all of these aspects were very unusual to England.
At the head of the table, with her back to the windows, sat a middle-aged woman who had just finished explaining that she had lived in the same small neighborhood where I came from, and knew all about Celia Allgood, the dogs, and many other life-long neighbors of mine. The world felt small again, but I still had a hard time believing it, until she provided irrefutable evidence regarding the neighborhood cats.
Oh what horrible things were done to these cats, she exclaimed. How they were treated in such inhuman ways! During this time I wondered if she preferred to have cats treated in human ways, but my thoughts were cut short by gruesome rumors of cats buried neck deep, lawnmowers, and detailed physical examination of the bodies that even Leo da Vinci would find unnecessary.
It's easy to imagine how a cat could find itself experiencing premature cessation. When sensing danger, a more modest animal will flee. Felines smugly insist that Danger is the out-of-place object and (with a hiss) will insist that Danger should flee. Danger is often a fast-moving Honda which, by nature, has listless momentum when confronted with the offended ego of a cat.
I was very familiar with the boys who behaved inhumanly. They were former friends of my older brother. This English woman slowly breathed each of their names the same way Voldemort said the word "Muggle."
Sensing that the injustice was keeping this woman awake at night, I did my best to put her at ease by explaining that the two ringleaders of the anti-cat club have since had a great deal of losing arguments with the Law (non-cat related), and have even had their shameful mugshots printed in the local newspaper. My attempt was successful, and she seemed to have lighter shoulders.
The last time I saw this well-traveled woman was in an English church parking lot. She was waiting for people like myself to exit the church so she could make an announcement. I asked her what news she had, she told me she had decided to join the Army. Given her age and physical condition, I imagined her at best as a civilian secretary in a bunker on an island somewhere. I asked her how she came to such a dramatic decision and she said it was inspiration from heaven. I heartily encouraged her, although I couldn't imagine what use she could be to the military.
Months later I discovered that it was The Salvation Army that I encouraged her to join, which made much more sense after recalling how often she felt offended by her original church.
I heard the details while I sat in a large English dining room lit only by natural afternoon sunlight shining in from bay windows, which provided pleasant lakeside views. Apart from the bay windows, all of these aspects were very unusual to England.
At the head of the table, with her back to the windows, sat a middle-aged woman who had just finished explaining that she had lived in the same small neighborhood where I came from, and knew all about Celia Allgood, the dogs, and many other life-long neighbors of mine. The world felt small again, but I still had a hard time believing it, until she provided irrefutable evidence regarding the neighborhood cats.
Oh what horrible things were done to these cats, she exclaimed. How they were treated in such inhuman ways! During this time I wondered if she preferred to have cats treated in human ways, but my thoughts were cut short by gruesome rumors of cats buried neck deep, lawnmowers, and detailed physical examination of the bodies that even Leo da Vinci would find unnecessary.
It's easy to imagine how a cat could find itself experiencing premature cessation. When sensing danger, a more modest animal will flee. Felines smugly insist that Danger is the out-of-place object and (with a hiss) will insist that Danger should flee. Danger is often a fast-moving Honda which, by nature, has listless momentum when confronted with the offended ego of a cat.
I was very familiar with the boys who behaved inhumanly. They were former friends of my older brother. This English woman slowly breathed each of their names the same way Voldemort said the word "Muggle."
Sensing that the injustice was keeping this woman awake at night, I did my best to put her at ease by explaining that the two ringleaders of the anti-cat club have since had a great deal of losing arguments with the Law (non-cat related), and have even had their shameful mugshots printed in the local newspaper. My attempt was successful, and she seemed to have lighter shoulders.
The last time I saw this well-traveled woman was in an English church parking lot. She was waiting for people like myself to exit the church so she could make an announcement. I asked her what news she had, she told me she had decided to join the Army. Given her age and physical condition, I imagined her at best as a civilian secretary in a bunker on an island somewhere. I asked her how she came to such a dramatic decision and she said it was inspiration from heaven. I heartily encouraged her, although I couldn't imagine what use she could be to the military.
Months later I discovered that it was The Salvation Army that I encouraged her to join, which made much more sense after recalling how often she felt offended by her original church.
March #1, Dogs
Celia Allgood, who lived across the street from my childhood home, had no legs and nearly a dozen dogs.
Her house smelled like warm wet hair and dog food. One of the dogs, aptly named Buttons, was the ugliest, meanest, most unpleasant beast imaginable. Buttons was the butt of family jokes, and we thought of clever ways to stab him with needles or sew him to train tracks. I don't know if I will ever fully understand why Celia kept company with this four-legged hobgoblin.
Paralyzed and widowed, Celia was the eternal dog-loving fountain of needs: turn off the sprinkler, find the missing dog, mow the lawn, chop the firewood, open the dog-door, change the light bulb, till the garden, defend against evil dog snatchers, etc. Her requests always seemed to interrupt the most important activity of the day, so my whole life was filled with Celia-avoiding strategy.
This attitude changed the last time I ever saw her. One evening she requested my service and I was too old to play dumb. During this visit Celia surprised me with a smart, pleasant, and conversational demeanor. And she gave me a gift--something warm for me to wear while in England.
Ignoring the habit of avoiding her, I carefully inspected her gift in my hands, thinking what a great job I'd done at turning my high-potential childhood into a dog-hating fountain of wasted video-gaming hours.
And I wasn't the only one avoiding her. As far as I could tell during my brief and unwilling visits over the years, the wall-covering collage of old family pictures stopped being replaced around the mid-70's.
I'd never met them before, but these family members were much more visible after Celia's death. Dividing assets is always a big task and requires the most heated passions to accomplish. The dogs were not assets, of course, but were divided still the same. They lost all value the moment Celia died. Then they disappeared--Buttons too--blanketing our neighborhood with creepy silence.
Her house smelled like warm wet hair and dog food. One of the dogs, aptly named Buttons, was the ugliest, meanest, most unpleasant beast imaginable. Buttons was the butt of family jokes, and we thought of clever ways to stab him with needles or sew him to train tracks. I don't know if I will ever fully understand why Celia kept company with this four-legged hobgoblin.
Paralyzed and widowed, Celia was the eternal dog-loving fountain of needs: turn off the sprinkler, find the missing dog, mow the lawn, chop the firewood, open the dog-door, change the light bulb, till the garden, defend against evil dog snatchers, etc. Her requests always seemed to interrupt the most important activity of the day, so my whole life was filled with Celia-avoiding strategy.
This attitude changed the last time I ever saw her. One evening she requested my service and I was too old to play dumb. During this visit Celia surprised me with a smart, pleasant, and conversational demeanor. And she gave me a gift--something warm for me to wear while in England.
Ignoring the habit of avoiding her, I carefully inspected her gift in my hands, thinking what a great job I'd done at turning my high-potential childhood into a dog-hating fountain of wasted video-gaming hours.
And I wasn't the only one avoiding her. As far as I could tell during my brief and unwilling visits over the years, the wall-covering collage of old family pictures stopped being replaced around the mid-70's.
I'd never met them before, but these family members were much more visible after Celia's death. Dividing assets is always a big task and requires the most heated passions to accomplish. The dogs were not assets, of course, but were divided still the same. They lost all value the moment Celia died. Then they disappeared--Buttons too--blanketing our neighborhood with creepy silence.
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