Under Pressure

I wake up in pain. Every morning, no matter the position I'm in. My back recently, aching. For weeks now, my hips, or one hip, or my knee. My hands have been numb in the morning for months. First just the thumb through middle finger of both hands. Now one entire hand is numb, either hand, each hand, one per morning. Sometimes it is two hours before the feeling comes back.

But every morning, I wake up and feel like a car accident was survived during the night. For a few minutes, I grimace quietly and try to shift appendages, to release the tension and get the pain away. Usually at this time it is just barely light out, the husband and the cats have been sleeping soundly. Lucy is attuned, she knows when I wake up, and her stuttering, crackling purr usually starts up within a minute. Just saying, Hi Mom. If I look over, there are her green eyes, peeking at me over the covers, smiling sleepy at me these first moments.

Sometimes I can't imagine the love I'll feel for this child, because the love that swells and lifts me bodily when I look at Lucy is frightening enough in its intensity.

Will the Cats Love My Baby?

Or, equally as important, Will the Baby Love My Cats or Will I Need to Release the Baby into the Wild for Wolves to Raise?

I have had a couple of people comment about the cats, and whether I'd get rid of them if for some reason there was a problem with the baby and them, or comment that they'd be interested to see how much spoil the cats once the baby comes. It is something that I think about, so I thought I'd explain myself a bit.

If, when the baby is born, there is a problem with the cats, I will go to every length possible to sort out the issue. I will hire behavioral experts, I will read books, I will do everything I can. And then as a last resort I will keep them separated, and if that still doesn't work, I don't know what my heartbroken self will do.  

I have had Lucy since she was 2. She is now 10 years old, and she has been my best friend this whole time. There have been some hard time, some sad times, some times when I went to bed crying every night. For months. There were weekends I didn't leave my bed. There were nights where I drank so much wine, I collapsed sobbing at my computer, writing tortured poems full of self-loathing and shame. Throughout the whole thing, Lucy always cuddled up to me and purred loudly and slept right with me and always ran to see me when I got home, and spent all her time within five feet of me.

Even now, she is sitting at my feet while I type this. She is old now, and not so spry, and she sleeps more than she eats (which was a ratio I'd never thought I'd see). The thought of abandoning her in her senior years is appalling to me. I can't do it. She has given me everything she's had to give all this time. She has been steadfastly devoted to me since the moment I met her.

The way we spoil them, well that is simply routine at this point. I've given my cats wet food for dinner for at least 7 years now. It is as natural as pouring a glass of water for me. The Pope has done the litter for the last several years, so that will stay the same, and the only thing I can think that will change is the attention that they currently get. But as much as we know the baby will take everything, the cats don't actually ask for much. A lap, a leg when we're sleeping, and brushing once in a while if we feel like it. 

And they're our friends, our family members, they are as much a part of who we are as anything else I can think of.  

We have Comcast cable, which has this great feature called On Demand.  They have a pet channel, and I found a brief show called "How to Acclimate Your Cat to a New Baby."  I was extremely eager to watch this, and selected it.   To my surprise, it was about 4 minutes long.  It said that cats are pretty neutral about babies, for the most part, and as long as you make sure not to ignore the cat completely, they generally get along fine with the new addition to the family.  And that was it. 

Being that Lucy is one of the most constant and loving friends I've ever known,  I think we'll be fine.   

If not, I will change the baby's name to Romulus.   Regardless of sex.

Happy Holidays!

We leave at the crack of dawn for Sacramento and my in-laws for the holidays.
BUT WAIT!

Before you gasp with mock horror at my plight - I LOVE my in-laws.
I'm looking forward to the trip!

And with that cheery news, I leave you the disgruntled residents of our house, who will hold the fort down and shed all over everything these next few days:


And, turn your head, because I'm tired and can't figure out how to straighten it:

Letters

Dear Lady in the Checkout Madness that is Costco,

Oh, bitch, PLEASE. I realize that you want out of here as much as I want out of here, but I'm in front of you, and if you think that inching your cart forward until it almost hits me is going to do anything, you're sadly mistaken. Unless that something you are looking for is me turning around and clawing your ugly face off. Because lady, I'm in that kind of mood.

I'm aware that this is the highlight of your week, when you dust out the ill-fitting gray sweats you've had since you were a fat teenager, roll off the couch with its 3 inches of cheeto dust, and drive slowly with your left blinker on all the way here to Costco. I'm pretty sure that you're finally of the age where you're all, "Fuck it, I'm an adult, and these young whipper snappers can suck it. I'm going to be rude and I'm going to act out all the aggression I have about not being as pretty as my sister, and be a complete and total bitch and they're all going to have to take it."

Well, honey, I'm not that young and I'm so so so totally not going to take it. You might be pushing that frizzy mop off your forehead and looking at my frizzy mop and thinking, "I can take her." And, oh, you'd be so wrong. My mop is frizzy because it is always like that, and yours is frizzy because it is an extension of your execrable life.

I guarantee you will never be a match for me,

Salome

Dear Lucy,

I have put up with a lot from you in your life. You're a miserable cat, but I've always loved you despite that. In the last few weeks you've become a totally unstable whackjob who is nothing but a nest of bitch and claws. If I have to hear your pissed off screech one more time, I'm going to snap. It seems that everything annoys you. If i walk past you, if I turn on music, when I grind coffee beans, if I shut the door to pee in peace.

I understand that you think your life sucks, but you have made mine suck in turn. When I carried you to the bed a couple nights ago and you freaked out and hissed at me, bit my head and scratched my face? THE END.

We have a new cat in the house, princess. And you are going to mellow the fuck out and let her live here. You let your brother disappear, and it broke your mom's heart. Do you hear me, Lucy? It broke my heart when your brother went away. You did not help me, not when I was sobbing and searching the backyard and begging you to come and smell him for me, and lead me to wherever he was. You have such a keen sense of smell that you probably know when a mouse farts in Kentucky, yet you did nothing. And I know you know what Finny smelled like, you've detested the scent since he came home in June of 2004.

This morning when you tripped me for the 3rd time, and this time tripped me so effectively that I hit the floor, after slamming against the wall in the hallway first, I had had enough. You hissed at my last nerve, Lucy. THAT is why I stomped toward you, screaming. You went under the bed, which was such a good idea, even though I've never hit you and I never will. If you make me fall and hurt myself again, I swear to God I'm making you into a hat.

Lucy, in the coming days you might notice something different about your water. It might taste slightly like natural flowers. Hopefully you will feel fairly mellow when you're done drinking it. I bought an all-natural item that is called GOOD CAT, supposed to calm down frantic or nasty cats. You are a nasty fucking cat, Lucy, and I hope you chill out.

I've had all I can stands and I can't stands no more,

Mom

BitchQueen of the House

I know I always post about Finny (who is not yet returned) to the detriment of my other kitties. But Finny was the superstar, always doing things that got and held your attention. The other kitties are older, more set in their ways, and less apt to do things that made you laugh out loud or shocked you.

Well, last night Lucy showed what she is made of. Something I have always joked about, and long suspected....she is a formidable little cat. Lucy is a little cat. She is short, close to the ground, and has tiny features. She is shaped not unlike a loaf of bread. She is zaftig (hee) and has a tiny tail, simply put there is nothing in her physical appearance that would give any other cats pause. But I know.....she is the meanest cat I've ever seen.

We adopted her out of a pound in San Diego. We were looking for a kitten to keep our one year old cat Cali company. We got to the pound, and there was little 4 pound Lucy, and when she saw me, she threw herself at the cage door. She did that repeatedly until I looked at my ex-husband and said, HER. She's the one. He said, she's not a kitten, she's not a boy, she's not at all what we are here to pick up. I said, no matter, it is her. I know this.

We adopted her and I took her home. She curled in the floor of the backseat passenger side and howled the entire drive home. I kept saying, You're OK, You're OK kitty, You're OK. I reached back there and soon as I touched her, she quieted down. And that was about it for Lucy and me. I'm her mom and she has always been MY CAT. No one else has ever been able to get as close to Lucy as they may wish.

She detested my ex-husband the entire time we lived together. She would climb on his lap, turn around and fart in his face, and then walk over the bed to lay on my legs. He hated that. The Pope has a boy, Leo, who Lucy has terrorized since they met. She does this all without much violence. She will glare at him, and makes him so fearful of her that we have to pick him up to move him past her. He will stand and cry on the other side until we rescue him. Finny used to torment Lucy, but she never really raised a hand to him. She would hiss and howl, but she rarely, if ever, acted toward her little brother with any real aggression.

But I knew. I knew in a pinch that she was the one to fear.
And that pinch came last night.

A huge white cat, once we keep seeing in the backyard, ambled in last night and sampled their food. Lucy was with me on the couch, and heard him first. She slinked off the couch and bristled. I saw the cat and jumped up. The cat darted out of the kitchen, and before I knew what was happening, Lucy shot toward the cat, snuck past the wall, with every intention of heading him off at the pass. She did, and very much surprised this huge cat. He was three times her size. She hit him with a football tackle, and they rolled, biting and clawing, the entire length of our hallway. Lucy was attacking this cat. The cat was doing everything he could to protect himself, but her ears were back and she wasn't making a sound. She was going for the kill. I saw this, saw them rolling and thought, she's going to kill it! Oh my god, she is going to kill this cat!! I followed the cats, shouting, Lucy, get in the office, stop it, stop it, stop it! I got them separated by walking up close and bending down and clapping loud right next to their ears. Lucy had rolled this white cat into a hissing, white hair flying ball to the end of the hallway, and then slammed him into the wall and was a vicious little loaf of bread-shaped anger. I got her into the office, shut the door, and meanwhile the cat ran for the door, his nails skittering on the wood, his hind legs flying, tufts of his hair swirling around the hallway. He ran past the door into the kitchen, Leo came into the kitchen, and the white cat was all, DUDE there are more of them! And he ran into the laundry room and vaulted out of the cat door.

I let Lucy out of the office, and when I looked down at my sweet girl, she was all business. She stalked out of the office and went low to the ground and started tracking the scent. She had tufts of white fur peeking out between her toes. She is absolutely unscathed from this. But she went to bed on the far end of the bed, the one closest to the bedroom door, and I think she was watching for him. We shut the cat door after the white cat left, but I want it open for Finny. I don't think that white cat will be coming back anytime real soon.

Let it be known henceforth.
Don't fuck with Lucy.