Nobody tells me anything. Here it is just over halfway through June when I learn it’s Adopt-a-Shelter-Cat Month. Having had some wonderful pets, both canine and feline, who came from shelters, I urge you, if you’re looking for a companion animal, to head to your local shelter. Give a needy cat (or dog) a forever home.
Petfinder and icanhascheezburger.com have teamed up to promote this important month. Visit both sites!
We are storytelling creatures, we humans. Our sentience notices our mortality and mixes with our fear and so we tell ourselves lots of stories about death.
We tell ourselves that the unjust are eternally punished in either darkness or flame. This is especially popular if the unjust are beyond our reach in this life.
Even more important: to stave off our personal dread of the trip each of us must take alone to Hamlet’s undiscovered country, or to console ourselves that the parting we now make with a loved one is not final, we tell stories about a Valhalla or a Heaven, where we and those we love will yet live and enjoy peace and plenty.
When a beloved pet dies, we may tell ourselves a story about how our furry family member has crossed Rainbow Bridge.
As a storyteller, I could probably come up with something good along these lines. But my stories would be no less wish fulfillment than these others. I am increasingly convinced that the only stories to be told at such a time, the only true stories, are those the mourners hold in still-living memory.
Today, I mourn, and I think this is no time for other stories or for the flights of fancy I create.
The more-than-year-long run of one new piece of fiction a week ends here. Grim, tearful reality now rules as we grieve for a wonderful little dog we knew for almost two years. Perhaps there will be more to say about this later; perhaps the stories I hold of him will work their way into other stories that will then be more true because of the sharing. And perhaps we’ll get back on track next week. For now…
how empty the yard
without him –
our well-loved Archie
And there it is: one full year of catsignal.
One full year of haiku and short stories. One of each per week with no absences.
I have to say I’m pretty proud of this achievement. I’m well aware that not every one of my posts is Pulitzer- or Nobel-worthy material. But the former newspaper editor in me knows that something is almost always better than nothing and that you have to meet the deadline and fill the space – and get the job done. My job is to entertain, and I like to think I’ve been meeting that goal, too.
So … continue catsignal.
And continue to enjoy.
Garrett Woolfolk rolled over in his bed, savoring the sensations of the cocooning sheets, the perfectly arranged pillows, and of not having to get up or meet anyone’s demands or deadlines. Both his students and his editor would be nursing hangovers at this hour and would leave him undisturbed. Also, he had trained his friends to forget his very existence until closer to noon.
Saturday mornings were bliss for Woolfolk.
“Mm, mm, mm?”
Woolfolk tensed; he had not made those sounds. A fear washed over him – the fear that his perfect Saturday morning was about to go the way of yesterday’s lunch.
He opened his eyes and his suspicions were confirmed. A chimpanzee stood underneath a jaunty yellow beret and it was looking intently, yet politely, at Woolfolk.
I’ve been catching up on some of the blogs I’ve neglected over the holidays. One of them (apologies) is 3quarksdaily, where one finds all sorts of thought-provoking essays.
I found one such essay from December 29 by Jeff Strabone titled The Jennifer Anniston in All of Us. It directly relates to Auld Acquaintance, which I had posted here not quite a day earlier. It’s about forgetting our past so we can live in our present. Check it out.
Leaning toward the cat side of Catsignal today, I want to remind everyone to take special care of their pets on this holiday.
The ASPCA has a list of things to keep in mind to protect your companion animals as you celebrate. Make it a happy Independence Day for you and your four-footed friends.
And maybe, just maybe, give a little thought to what the Declaration of Independence says about tyranny and the reasons why we formed our own country.
One day, perhaps soon, this post will be considered quaint. I’m writing it for those who don’t know what the Creative Commons license on the About page means. I’m writing it for those who don’t yet understand why I’m putting my creative genius (silence, there, in the peanut gallery!) on the Web for all to see, making no money and apparently inviting others to simply take what’s here.
There’s lots more explanation to be had than I’m going to offer. Just toddle over to the Creative Commons Web site and you can learn all you ever hoped to and then some. My focus here is on what it means to thee and me.
“My son, the writer, thinks I should say something profound on this occasion. He even offered to write me a brief statement. I told him I’d take care of it myself. But, as it turns out, the only thing I can think of is: Begin Captain’s Log.”
— Captain Benjamin Sisko
“The Adversary”
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
We attach great importance to beginnings. We use silver shovels to turn the earth when an important building project begins. We smash a bottle of champagne across the hull of a ship to launch her. Cigars are traditionally given to friends at the birth of a child, and there are religious ceremonies that publicly connect the new child to God or the gods.
Because I am steeped in this human desire to mark a beginning, I feel that I should write something special for my first post. Like Captain Sisko, however, I think simplicity is best: Begin Catsignal.
And enjoy.