Once there was a kitty who chose us as her family. My husband had seen her around the neighborhood, and one day she came trotting through the flowerbed up to our door and asked to be let in.
Dan instantly wanted to keep her. She was a young-ish calico, and he knew how much I love calicos. But I wasn’t sure. Our most recent calico, Julia, who was the most beautiful cat in the world (or so she told us) had died just a little while before, and I didn’t think I was ready to give my heart to another one.
Then fate stepped in. We saw a flyer in our neighborhood for a missing calico cat. The address was very close to us. So we called the people who put up the flyer and invited them over to check out the stray.
At this point, any normal person would have held out the cat and said, “Is this her?”
But I’m not (as you probably have noticed) a normal person. I left the cat in the bathroom, which is where we keep stray cats until they pass a vet check.
I approached the guy, the putative owner. “So you’ve lost your cat.”
“Yes,” he said.
“A calico.”
“Yes.”
“Is she thin or chonky?”
“Medium, I guess.”
“What color are her eyes?”
“Yellow.”
I continued the interrogation.
“What color is her nose?”
“Pink.”
“What’s her chin look like?”
“I don’t know. Nothing special, I guess.”
“What color are her feet?”
“White….” (He was beginning to catch on to the not-normal thing.)
He was batting less than 50 percent. Her nose was pink and her feet were white, which could have been true of any cat. But there were telltales. The stray was slender, not medium. There was a slight gray smudge on her chin. She had one green eye and one yellow, which was a dead giveaway.
At that point, I brought the cat out.
“No,” the neighbor said, disappointed. “That’s not her.” And he sadly left.
That was the moment that I knew that not only had she chosen us, but I had chosen her too.
We named her Dushenka (Russian for “Little Soul”) and she stayed with us for 12 years. She still escaped and went walkabout on occasion, just to keep her hand—er, her paw—in, but she always came back to us. We were hers.
My friend Tom Smith wrote a funny song containing the phrase “cran-apple schnapps” as an idea for a repellent beverage. Then Ocean Spray came up with Cran-Apple drink and suddenly, the whole thing seemed a bit less ridiculous. (Linguists used to have a thing called a cranberry morpheme, a part of a word that could only be used with one other word part. Cran only went with berry. Then Ocean Spray got creative and now the cranberry morpheme is a thing of the past. I guess now they call it a huckleberry morpheme. But I digress. Pedantically.)
Now Ocean Spray has even more flavors, including white-cran-strawberry, white-cran-peach, cran-lemonade, cran-tangerine, cran-pomegranate, cran-pineapple, cran-raspberry, cran-blueberry, cran-blackberry, cran-grape, cran-mango, cran-ruby-red-grapefruit, cran-citrus-mango-pineapple, cran-cherry, cran-lime, and cran-iced-tea. To me, they all sound like okay flavors for nonalcoholic beverages, but lousy flavors for schnapps.
Schnapps ought to come in regular flavors like peppermint and peach. (While doing my research for this post, I came across Cactus Juice Schnapps. My initial reaction was bleh, but I don’t really know and have no desire to find out. But I digress again.)
Vodka is another liquor that comes in an alarming variety of flavors: lemon, lime, lemon-lime, orange, tangerine, grapefruit, raspberry, strawberry, blueberry, teaberry, vanilla, black currant, chili pepper, cherry, apple, green apple, coffee, chocolate, cranberry, peach, pear, passion fruit, pomegranate, plum, mango, white grape, banana, pineapple, coconut, mint, melon, rose, herbs, bacon, honey, cinnamon, kiwifruit, whipped cream, tea, root beer, caramel, marshmallow, and many more.
I think I understand the fruit-flavored ones since vodka drinks often include limes, cranberries, or other fruits. But bacon vodka is just weird. Whipped cream and marshmallow flavors just sound abominable and an occasion for projectile barfing. (I understand that flavored vodkas were invented to entice more women to drink more vodka. Hasn’t worked on me. But I digress some more.)
Whiskey hasn’t escaped the flavor-fying either. Now there are whiskeys subtly or not-so-subtly tasting of spiced apple, cinnamon, cherry peach, apple, vanilla, peanut butter, blackberry, salted caramel, chocolate, caramel turtle, cookie dough, honey, jalapeno honey, chocolate cherry cream, banana, praline, gingerbread, black cherry, maple, strawberry, chocolate mint, ruby red grapefruit, salty watermelon, mango habanero, peanut butter jalapeno, marshmallow chocolate, coconut, birthday cake, whipped cream, pineapple, kettle corn, barbecue, butterscotch, s’mores, rocky road, espresso martini, pumpkin pie, lemon pepper, candy cane, blood orange, strawberry banana, and grilled pineapple. There’s even one called Elvis Midnight Snack whiskey with flavors of peanut butter, banana, and bacon.
(I sort of understand coffee whiskey, because there’s a wonderful whiskey drink called Irish Coffee. Chocolate mint, however—I love chocolate mints and I like whiskey, and I may or may not have eaten a chocolate mint while sipping whiskey, but as far as making the two one, I’ll pass. But I digress yet again.)
Soda flavors are getting more inventive too. I’ve recently encountered Spiced Coke, which is supposed to have an undertone of raspberry, but the only flavor I get when I drink it is cinnamon. I rather like it. There’s also Strawberries and Cream Dr. Pepper, which Dan likes; Cherry Lime Sprite; Baja Blast Mountain Dew (tropical lime, colored blue for some reason); vanilla, cherry, peach oolong tea, and mango Pepsi; Coke black cherry, lime, lemon, raspberry, mango or Coke marshmello (their spelling); 7-up cherry, citrus, orange, raspberry, tropical twist, pink grapefruit, pomegranate, and mixed berry; Dr. Pepper cream soda and cherry vanilla; and Mountain Dew cherry, lime, orange, raspberry, watermelon, lemonade peach, citrus cherry, and blackberry. Some of those are limited-time flavors or ones sold only overseas.
I don’t resent the fact that companies are introducing new flavors. Some of them I even like, and others my husband likes. And I know that adding new flavors is a way for them to attract new buyers who haven’t been satisfied with the usual choices.
But, for heaven’s sake, guys. Too much of a good thing is not necessarily a good thing. You’re taking up too much space on the shelves, and they’ll run out of the flavors I want. Use some restraint!
There’s a phenomenon called “search engine optimization,” or SEO for short. And I’ve grown to hate it.
The idea of SEO is to increase the chances of your post, article, book, or whatever being at the top of the responses to a Google search. Writers and publishers in particular are invested in making sure that their wares gain the attention of Google and then potential readers.
SEO works by focusing on keywords. There are certain words and phrases that people search for more than others. If your work contains these words, it will appear further up the Google results and, presumably, increase sales. It’s all about “search visibility” and marketing strategies. There are plenty of books and websites that teach you how to improve your SEO game.
What are some of the best, top keywords that people search for? Well, best and top show up high on the lists. Everyone wants to know the best places to eat or the top-rated appliances, so those words show up a lot. “How to” is another search term that gets top results.
There are lists of keywords for any number of fields. If you have a book or article on health and fitness, your SEO keywords include “weight loss,” “lifetime fitness,” and “health tips.” Business keywords include “money” (of course), “opportunity,” “income,” and “profitability.” There are lists of keywords for coffee, dog training, and poker, among many, many others. For one of my areas of interest, mental health, keywords include “symptoms,” “medication,” and “side effects.” There are companies that specialize in giving you a list of keywords for your project—for a price.
What really ticks me off is what this has done to book subtitles. (Yes, I know that there are much more important things to be ticked off about, especially these days. However, I work in the publishing field, so I get to see a lot of subtitles. But I digress.)
Let’s start with one that isn’t all that annoying: How to Sustain Personal and Organizational Excellence Every Day. Eight words only. But look at the SEO keywords. We have Personal and Organizational Excellence. Sustain may be a keyword too, and so might Every Day. What could the author have done instead? Organizational Excellence ought to do it. Combined with a title like Habits for Success, that ought to do it. Still plenty of SEO words. Or just have a title: Success and Organizational Excellence. No subtitle. But that goes against every publishing rule, evidently.
Here’s another subtitle that’s been reined in just a bit: Reflections on Death, Rebirth, and Hunger for a Faith. Nine words. It says what you’ll find in the book without going on and on. Just enough to pique the potential readers’ interest. (While we’re on the subject of things that tick me off (and I think we were), I cringe whenever I see “peak” someone’s interest, or, God help me, “peek.” But I digress again.)
Now here’s a subtitle that goes a little further overboard: Dynamic Techniques for Turning Fear, Indecision, and Anger into Power, Action, and Love. Thirteen words. Dynamic Techniques, Power, Action, and Love are obvious self-help SEOs. I can imagine the title that would go with it: Transform Your Life.
Let’s keep going. Next on my list of terrible subtitles is Stop People Pleasing, Staying Silent, & Feeling Guilty… And Start Speaking Up, Saying No, Asking Boldly, And Unapologetically Being Yourself. Twenty words, one of them a mouthful by itself: unapologetically. Honestly, I think you could read the first chapter in the time it takes to read the subtitle.
Finally, here’s a subtitle that really grates: Transform Your Body in 28 Days with Illustrated Exercises. Lose Belly Fat, Sculpt Glutes, and Feel More Energized in Just 10 Minutes a Day! Twenty-four words, four verbs, and a plethora of nouns and adjectives. And a promise with an exclamation point. What is there left to say in the book? Whoever wrote that subtitle ought to have their thyroid checked.
On the other hand, maybe I’m just jealous. I wrote two books before SEO took off. (I still get royalties. I’m saving up for a pizza. But I digress some more.) Maybe I should have called them Bipolar Me: The True Story of One Woman’s Journey Through Mental Illness, Depression, and Hypomania, Based on Her Weekly Journal of the Same Name and Bipolar Us: A Deep Dive into Bipolar Disorder and Its Devastating Effects on Sufferers and Society, the Highs and Lows That Come With It, and How to Find Peace and Stability.
Of course, if I did that, the subtitles would have had to be printed in little tiny type, another aspect of publishing that really ticks me off. With my bad eyesight, I wouldn’t even be able to read my own subtitles. I can’t win.
I used to live in a drafty log cabin on a windy hill. There were plenty of odd noises, especially at night. Now I live in a regular home in a windy valley, with lots of clutter. There are still plenty of odd noises, especially at night.
It’s been my policy to blame the cats (usually from three to five of them) for any noises – rattling, thumping, skittering, whining, tapping, crashing, howling, et endless cetera. Even if every cat in the house is occupying my lap at the time, I still try to find a way to blame alarming noises on them.
One night, however, my husband and I were peacefully sleeping when I thought I heard a noise in the living room.
It sounded like whispering.
Whatever else they do, cats don’t whisper. For once I couldn’t blame them. It had to be burglars, I thought, discussing what they wanted to take or which house to hit next or why we had such crappy stuff and was any of it worth anything.
I didn’t want to wake my husband, because then I’d have my N.O.W. card taken away, so I tried to remember where we put the baseball bat and extended my hearing as far as it would go. I crept closer to the bedroom door, where I could hear the sounds better.
Then I realized that the noise was indeed people whispering. In French.
Even in my fearful, dazed state, I couldn’t believe that there were actually burglars in my house, in Ohio, speaking French.
So I tiptoed into the living room. If for some unlikely reason, there were French-speaking burglars, I could astound them with my knowledge of French, threaten to call the gendarmes, or at least ask them for directions to the bibliothèque. (That’s most of what I remember of my high school and college French. I also remember some of my college Russian, in which I can say useful things like “Excuse me, please. Where do they sell books on history?” and “Yes, cabbage is a good thing.” (At least I would never be bored or starve.) But I digress.)
When I tentatively poked my head into the living room, however, I found the French speakers were on the television. A foreign film was playing. Funny. I hadn’t left the TV on when I went to bed.
Hm. My husband doesn’t watch foreign films or know any French or other foreign languages. (Actually, that’s not quite true. He knows a song in high school German that goes “My hat has three corners. Three corners has my hat. If it doesn’t have three corners, it’s not my hat.” But I digress some more.) Besides, he was asleep in bed.
Then I realized what had happened. Someone had activated the remote and selected a film channel. With the sound very low. Although I couldn’t name the culprit, it was clearly Matches or Maggie or Chelsea or Shaker, all of whom were giving me the “Who, me?” look. One of them had done it, or they had all cooked up the plot together. There was no use dusting for paw-prints. No doubt they had wiped them off with their floofy tails.
So the one time I knew it couldn’t be the cats, it was. Now I blame them for everything. Always.
I can’t believe that a rainbow is controversial, but there you have it. These days it is. The problem is that the rainbow means many different things to many different people.
This being Pride Month, we see a lot of pride flags, shirts, coffee cups, buttons, posts, memes, etc. with rainbows on them. They are brightly colored rainbows, not the more pastel kind you see in the sky after a rain. They’re meant to symbolize sexual diversity and visibility. The rainbow flag was first flown in 1978 at the San Francisco Gay Freedom Day parade. Now the rainbow flag stands for gay pride. You also see flags with white, pink, and blue, and black and brown added in some configuration for trans visibility and POC intersectionality.
There’s pushback, though. There’s the question of whether—and how much—rainbow merchandise should be displayed in mass-market retail stores during Pride Month. The manufacturers and sellers, whether they actually support the LGBTQIA+ community or not, naturally want to make money, and their first instinct is that people supportive of gay pride will buy rainbow-themed products. The pushback comes from some in the heterosexual community who feel that too much square footage and prominence have been given over to gay pride merchandise. Fearing that they would lose money if the complaining heterosexuals shopped elsewhere, some retailers cut down on the stock of rainbow merchandise or put it in the back of stores so it would be, if not back in the closet, at least less in-your-face.
Some Christians also push back against the rainbow-as-gay-pride concept by invoking religion. The rainbow, they say, belongs to God and is not to be associated with what they see as sin. It was a sign of God’s promise never to destroy the world with a flood again and so symbolizes holiness, faithfulness, and salvation. I’ve seen Facebook posts and memes promoting this understanding of rainbows and an attempt to “take back” the rainbow for God.
Call me pedantic, but no one seems to talk about what a rainbow actually is. It’s a product of refraction, which Sir Isaac Newton explained in 1665 when sunlight hit a prism and produced a color spectrum that resembled a rainbow. National Geographic defines a rainbow this way: “a multicolored arc made by light striking water droplets.” The controversy over rainbows, however, is not about what they are but what they symbolize.
Symbols, to get pedantic again, are not absolutes. They mean what we put into them, what we believe about them. And they change meanings over time. The Don’t Tread on Me flag (technically called the Gadsden Flag) was once a symbol of Colonial America’s resistance to the British. More recently, it became associated with the Tea Party movement and other right-wing causes. What does it symbolize now? Independence (though not from the British)? No taxation? Anti-government sentiment in general? Objections to one particular political party? All of the above? None of the above? When there’s that little agreement, the symbolic meaning fades out and the flag simply means “I’m angry” or perhaps “I’m defiant.”
The same is true of the American flag as a symbol. To some people, it represents the United States itself. To others, it means American ideals like liberty and justice for all. To still others, it stands for the US military. So if you disrespect the flag (in whatever way) who or what you’re disrespecting—the nation, the ideals, or the military—depends on how you interpret the symbol. (There’s no pushback at all against flag-themed clothing. At one time that was thought to be disrespectful too. It’s part of the US Flag Code that the flag shouldn’t be worn as clothing, but hardly anyone knows that anymore, much less abides by it.)
So, back to the rainbow. Going on the principle that a symbol means what you put into it, there’s no use fighting over what it means. It means different things to different people in different circumstances. Everyone is entitled to associate it with any meaning they prefer, whether that be gays or God. Or, as I prefer, refracted light in the sky that looks pretty. That’s a lot less contentious.
Now I wait for the comments that I’m disrespecting gays, God, or America (though probably not Sir Isaac Newton). You’re entitled to your symbolism. But no one owns the rainbow.
It all started with a vulgar radio ad and turned into an adventure. ([sultry female voice: I wanna ride!])
I really hated the ads, but the premise was intriguing—a weekend horseback camping trip, complete with guide. So Dan and I gathered up Sheila and Harold—another couple who had an interest in horses—and signed up.
(All this was in the days before I abused my back by riding an Arabian horse bareback. The first time I annoyed it was when I had to carry wood up two flights of stairs or freeze to death. But I digress.)
Anyway, we met Larry, our guide, who showed up with four horses and all manner of camping equipment. He set up two tents for us and even found a way to connect my husband’s CPAP machine to power. Then we went out on the trail.
I didn’t have any trouble managing my horse at that point. But Sheila couldn’t get her horse to giddy-up no matter how she kicked, shook the reins, and verbally encouraged it along. It remained stubborn. (Later in life, Sheila and Harold bought horses of their own. Sheila even taught her horse dressage. But I digress again.)
The woods we rode through were as scenic as could be. There were trees that provided cool shade in the heat of the summer day. Unfortunately, Dan’s horse made a game of bumping into tree trunks and whacking his knees. The horses proceeded at a walk or a trot and occasionally broke into a canter. Frankly, I preferred the walk and the canter. The walk gave me time to look around and the canter was exhilarating and didn’t involve bumping up and down quite as much as the bruising trot.
We rode deep into the woods and then the nature, which was all around us, called. Dan had no problems with this (aside from getting down off his horse) and neither did Harold, but Sheila and I had to pee al fresco. (Fortunately, this was a skill I acquired in my youth on backpacking trips. I knew enough to carry tissues and avoid poison ivy. This is one of the only times I can truly be said to have had penis envy. But I digress some more.)
When we returned to camp in the evening, we learned that Larry was also our cook and an old hand at producing good meals over a wood fire. Not to say gourmet meals. This was before glamping was a thing.
Larry also rustled up a fine breakfast as we crawled out of our tents. We ached not just from the (admittedly) less-than-strenuous riding, but also from sleeping on thin tarps that only emphasized the pebbles beneath. We were all more interested in having several cups of very good coffee than getting back on the horses. This, of course, would cause a recurrence of the peeing problem later in the day.
Around the campfire that night, Larry told us how he had started his business and how other campers spent the whole time galloping their horses from one end of a field to the other and back again. No marauding trees or recalcitrant steeds for them.
The next day, we were back to our regular lives and jobs. There were some mementos of our experience. Dan had bashed-up knees. And you should have seen my inner thighs. (Well, no, you shouldn’t.)
While it was a memorable experience, we seriously doubted that we would be repeat customers. We were just too candy-ass. All in all, the adventure was like the Tower of Terror ride at DisneyWorld. It’s not that the horseback adventure was terrifying. It’s just that I’m glad I went on it once, but I’d hesitate to try it again, especially since my back won’t let me.
Of course, that’s not completely true. There are things I can commit to—my husband, for example. We’ve been married for 41 years, which I think is proof aplenty.
What I can’t commit to are things that go on too long. (The marriage does not fit into that category.)
Let me explain.
Movies
In the evenings, when my husband and I have finished dinner, he often wants to watch a movie, but I don’t often agree to it. I hate leaving a movie in the middle, but I also hate staying up past my bedtime to finish one. It’s a delicate balance.
For example, after the recent eclipse, we decided on Ladyhawke, which was relevant, but I couldn’t make it all the way through. We had to watch the second half the next day and that upset my internal clock, not to mention my sense of continuity. If a movie starts at 8:00, it’s pretty much out of the running for me. I’m a little old lady and don’t like staying up past 9:00. (And you can get off my lawn. If I had one, I mean. Dan is aiming for a pollinator garden. But I digress.)
TV Series
When it comes to TV, I hate to start a series because I realize I’ll never keep up with it every week. This doesn’t apply to series that have already finished. Often, old episodes of House, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Castle, Inkmaster, Chopped, or Bones are shown for several hours a day, and those I can tolerate multiple episodes of. (That may sound counterintuitive. The difference seems to be that I don’t have to pay attention to them. I usually have them on when I’m doing something else like writing. They’re just my emotional support background noise. But I digress again.)
Books
I used to be able to tolerate series of books. I devoured The Lord of the Rings, Asimov’s Foundation trilogy, Lloyd Alexander’s Prydain series, Sue Grafton’s Alphabet books, and other long-running written endeavors. Not anymore. I buy many of my e-books from discount sites for $1.99 or $2.99 (because I’m cheap). Many of them, as you might suppose, are not exactly scintillating. Some of them are so dreadful I give up on them well before I reach the denouement.
(One of the first ones I ever committed libris interruptus on was a horror novel that started by introducing the protagonists. They were perfect. Perfect looks. Perfect jobs. Perfect house. Perfect marriage. Perfect kids. By the end of the first chapter, I was rooting for the monster, which hadn’t even shown its tentacles, fangs, slime, or whatever. But I digress some more.)
I recently discovered that even book series I love can be too much of a commitment. I recently reread the three volumes of The Lord of the Rings, but couldn’t jump right into The Silmarillion. I love Lois McMaster Bujold’s Vorkosigan series and set out to reread them all, but pooped out after book ten. I needed a break (a la Friends) and haven’t come back to finish the other four. Yet. I have a feeling that after 600 pages of Midnight in Chernobyl, my current good read, I’ll be ready. (I hate the phrase “a good read.” It sounds too much like saying someone is a “good lay.” But I digress yet again.)
I haven’t even reread my own books (Bipolar Me and Bipolar Us). They don’t constitute much of a series and would make a terrible movie. But that’s not the reason. There’s a terrible typo in the first one, and I’m afraid I’ll find one in the second as well. If I weren’t depressed about the slim sales, that would do it.
Well, yes I have. More than a bit. I’m going to a high school reunion this year (one of the big ones), and I don’t expect to hear that I haven’t changed.
Of course, most of us have changed. In addition to our age, our weight, hair color, careers, and family are not likely to be the same as they were in high school. (I would say, like the old joke, that I can still wear the earrings I wore in high school. But that’s not true. I didn’t get my ears pierced until I was in my 20s. But I digress.)
Many things have happened in my life that I’m fairly sure will surprise the other alums. Here’s a list of the sort that some reunions publish in a handy booklet in order to re-introduce ourselves. Instead of places I’ve traveled and impressive career milestones, I offer for your consideration these changes I’ve gone through.
I’m married and have been for 41 years, which I never expected back then. No children. (Or, obviously, grandchildren, which I know many of my former classmates have. I anticipate having many pictures offered to me for oohs and ahs. I’ll start practicing now. But I digress again.)
I kept my birth name. (I don’t like the term “maiden name” because it implies that all brides are virgins, and we know this is not the case. I wore an ivory dress so no one would snicker. But I digress some more.)
I now swear like a highly educated sailor. I learned how when I was a waitress, working my way through college.
I have bipolar disorder. I talk about it openly. When I was in high school (and after), I had a reputation for being moody, difficult, and weird, which there was also no hiding. So at least now there’s an explanation for that.
Despite the fact that I majored in English in both undergrad and grad school, I have never become a burger-flipper or a retail worker. I’ve managed to stay employed more or less in my field, having been an editor/writer, college teaching assistant, and now, ghostwriter. (I’ll skip right over my tenure as a meeting transcriptionist (even though I’m the world’s worst typist, never having taken it in school, which proved to be a big mistake when I had to write all those papers in college) and a security system monitor. I also once had a job inventorying hardware stores at night after they closed. One does what one has to in order to keep cat food in the bowl. But I digress yet again.)
I have tattoos. Two of punctuation, one of books, one for my mother (a compass rose and a yellow rose), and one for my husband (heart locket and key; he has a matching one).
The last time I had a big reunion to go to, I was beyond anxious. My high school days were not happy ones. I asked my hairstylist to make me look sane and successful. My friend Mary Jo, who worked for the local paper (now retired), wrote a column about my pre- and post-reunion experiences. This time, I’m encouraged by the number of my former classmates who’ve said they would like to see me there.
I’ve said I’d go to at least the casual drinks get-together (oh, yes, I also drink alcohol now, at least to the extent of a couple of beers). And I’ll bring my husband, who’s entertaining because he looks like Jerry Garcia. More than that, I can’t promise. I believe I’ll skip the picnic/dance. My knees are shot— bionic knees to come. In that, I know I resemble some of my former classmates. However, just sitting there while everyone else dances doesn’t appeal.
As for the rest of it, I’m no longer so worried about appearing sane and successful. This time, I’d rather appear happier and more interesting.
Lots of people refer to their pets as “fur-babies.” Other people think it’s disrespectful to human babies and their parents. I’m here to weigh in on the debate about which kind of baby is better.
I’ve had cats for many years. I almost never refer to them as fur-babies.
I do treat them like babies, however. I babble baby talk at them. I cradle them in my arms like babies (if they let me). I give them cutesie nicknames (like ToTo BooBoo). I’ve never had to bottle-feed a kitten, but you’d better believe I would. And I’ve even zerberted a cat whose belly had been shaved. It made a “foof” noise. (Autocorrect wanted to change “zerberted” to “perverted.” It has a point. But I digress.)
When I married, all I could offer my in-laws were grand-kittens and grand-puppies. It wasn’t that we couldn’t have human babies. We just never did. (Fortunately, Dan’s brother took care of that duty, and his kids have supplied assorted great-grands, four of whom are even close enough to visit Mom Reily. She has cats, too. I don’t know if she calls them fur-babies. But I digress again.)
One thing that people who do call their cats (and maybe their dogs) fur-babies do is dress them up in precious little outfits. I can’t approve of it. I’m with cat guru Jackson Galaxy on that issue. Maybe at Halloween, just for the day, but forget about little Easter outfits. Cats are not known for appreciating bonnets. I think they’re almost guaranteed to shred them, and there goes your investment. Dogs may be more accommodating, but they just look goofy (or Goofy).
Many comparisons can be made between baby types. Both kinds have their own little personalities, play adorably, and are great to cuddle. Both human babies and fur-babies are endlessly distracting and good for some laughs.
It takes a couple of years to potty-train a human baby and get them to eat people-food. Kittens come practically litter-trained and are able to eat kitten-food as soon as they’re old enough to leave their mama. (They can also eat people-food, though it’s not advisable. But I’ve had cats that have eaten and enjoyed pumpkin, corn, bread (one would tear open a loaf of bread and eat a couple of slices, making croutons of the rest), doughnuts, and chocolate bars (yes, yes, I know, those are bad for pets, but Anjou suffered no ill effects.) But I digress some more.)
Fur-babies are superior to human babies because you don’t have to save for their college or worry about them boosting cars or getting into any drugs other than catnip. Throughout their lives, it’s possible to pick them up and hold them (unless we’re talking St. Bernards).
Human babies are superior to fur-babies because, after a certain amount of time, they can talk and tell you what’s causing them distress. (Until then, they equal fur-babies in yowling and howling.) They do cool things like graduate from high school and college and get married. (Both fur-babies and human babies are eventually capable of producing offspring, of course. I don’t know of any trap-neuter-release strategies for human babies. That would just be wrong. But I digress yet again.)
I must admit to preferring fur-babies. But human babies are superior to fur-babies in one major regard—you can expect them to live a good long time (barring unfortunate circumstances, of course). You’re lucky if your fur-babies live 20 years—most don’t make it that long.
If you have fur-babies, you must prepare yourself for losing a being that you love dearly. I won’t say that you love them as much as you’d love a human baby, but their loss does leave a hole in your heart that even another fur-baby can’t totally fill. You may swear that you’ll never get another one, but somehow you always do, even knowing that that fur-baby’s life is limited too. They’re addictive that way.
We put ourselves through it again and again for the love of fur-babies. Their lives may be limited, but love and sorrow balance out in some equation that’s emotional, not mathematical. Love never is.
It’s well-known (by people who know me) that I love punctuation. I read books about punctuation. I have two punctuation tattoos. My favorite mark of punctuation is the semicolon (which is one of the tattoos I have). But lately, when it comes to punctuation, the asterisk is in the ascendancy. And that’s because an increasing number of books have swear words in their titles. Punctuation is how we address the problem delicately.
The first example of the trend and at the time most shocking was Go the F**k to Sleep, a book that purported to be a read-to-kids goodnight book, but was really an expression of parental frustration. It caused quite a buzz.
After that came The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck (and the more daintily titled The Subtle Art of Not Caring About People’s Opinion), I Used to Be a Miserable F*ck, Unfu*k Yourself, The French Art of Not Giving a Sh*t, and F*ck Feelings. For those who prefer hashtags, there’s Unf#ck Your Brain. The winner for the longest title is The Life-Changing Magic of Not Giving a F*ck: How to Stop Spending Time You Don’t Have with People You Don’t Like Doing Things You Don’t Want to Do (A No F*cks Given Guide). And Everything is #@%!ed! uses a whole string of punctuation. Fucking This shit Show: A Gratitude Journal for Tired Women dispenses with the veil of punctuation altogether. (I can’t help that inconsistent capitalization. That’s the way it’s written. Maybe shit is supposed to look less threatening in lowercase? But I digress.)
(When marks of punctuation are used as stand-ins for letters or words, they’re called “grawlix,” an almost completely useless word, but one I’m quite fond of. Most people have seen grawlix only in comic books when Popeye, for example, wants to cuss. But I continue digressing.)
What’s the reason for all the daintily disguised sweary titles? It’s not like we don’t know what the asterisks stand for. It’s not fooling anyone. Go the F**k to Sleep was obviously meant to be shocking, though it also expressed humor and frustration. After that, it looks like a bandwagon was jumped on. The book even jumped on its own bandwagon. Now it’s a trilogy, including You Have to F**king Eat and F**k, Now There Are Two of You.
(I note that most of the sweary titles go with self-help books. Does this indicate a certain irreverence regarding the concept of self-help? Frustration with the concepts in the books? I know I’ve wanted to swear at self-help books during various periods of my life. Now I write them, though (so far) none have titles that require grawlix. But I digress some more.)
Personally, I have no objection to swearing. For a long time, I couldn’t do it, but after working as a waitress, I made up for lost time. Now I swear like a sailor, though with better enunciation. Sometimes, a curse word is just the right one. And of course, when I use a swear word in writing, I punctuate it properly. No grawlix here.
My favorite unexpected use of punctuation, however, comes in this brief verse:
Mary’s little lamb / Upon the grass did frisk. / But Mary was afraid / Her little * .
But I Digress . . . 