Soft Saturday Wakening

Soft rain woke me up this morning. I realized I wasn’t going to get in an early morning bike ride so I laid back and listened to the world wake up. Boo stretched out on my chest and purred, giving me “Kitty Reiki” to start my day. Blue jays, chickadees, and other birds I cannot name started a morning chorus with a quiet percussion of rain drops on the window. A rooster added his own refrain.

The world smells fresh and clean this morning and it appears that most of the heavy air of the almost 100 degree days of this past week has passed on. The sky is gray and threatening more rain.

I rose and meditated after starting lentils and quinoa for a salad I will finish later today. In a few minutes I will head out to a morning yoga class followed by errands and a much needed massage.

I don’t think that Saturday mornings get much better than this.

Lucie and Logan - A Cat Story

There is a wonderful hollow in Gilsum, NH where deer, beaver and moose roam through people’s yards and a magnificent sunset is painted in the sky on most evenings. I was fortunate to have lived there for a little over a year.

I was renting a couple of rooms in a log home from Kat and her brood of lively cats. When I first moved in at the end of March of 2008, she had four cats: Gabriel, Percival, Elliot and Sasparilla. Sadly, by the end of June, Gabriel and Percival had both died and had left to grow wings. Elliot, a lovely Buddha-like tabby cat was lonely (he didn’t get along well with Sasparilla) and Kat started to look at shelter websites until she found “the tots.” In July, she brought home a pair of brothers, Raphael, a long haired orange tabby, and Kylie-Pietro, a black and white. They were lively balls of fluff that soon took over the house. They were up the stairs, down the stairs, taking short naps with Elliot, getting into everything possible, sleeping in peach boxes, killing flies and knocking over plants. They were the terrible twosome and it was wonderful!!

Things were set to get even more interesting, however. There was a stray cat roaming the neighborhood. She looked like she could use a good meal and Kat was concerned. Kat borrowed a Have-A-Heart trap, set it up, and soon this new cat was sleeping on the porch waiting to be checked out by the vet. Kat named her Lucie and it was evident that she had been someone’s cat before but we did not have a clue to what her life had been like. She was mostly white with yellow spots, a kink at the end of her tail, and a sour look on her face at all times.

Kat had her vetted and it was estimated that she was around thirteen years old and in very good health. She was ready to be introduced to the Tots and Elliot. Lucie immediately let everyone know that she was not to be messed with and established her place fairly high up in the household pecking order.

It was only a few days later that Kat’s brother, Chris, and his wife, Bev, were traveling to a barnraising in Maine when they found a cat and her kittens left abandoned on the side of the road. The kittens were barely over a month old and everyone was starving. Chris and Bev worked quickly to find homes for everyone and, unfortunately, the litter needed to be split up in order to so. The next thing I knew, Kat had added a tiny little kitten to the brood. He was named Logan and he was small enough to fit in the palm of my hand.

I will never forget coming home from work just a couple of days later to find Lucie nursing Logan. I was shocked. Lucie was 91 in cat years and here she was mothering Logan. Kat said that Logan had been running around and Lucie started chirping at him. The next thing she knew, Logan was cuddled up with Lucie as if they had always been mother and son. We would often find them curled up in a basket together with Logan’s body barely visible.

The timing of Kat finding Lucie, and then Logan, has always struck me as a gift. Those two cats needed each other. Logan needed a mom to teach him all the important things that mother cats teach their young and Lucie needed a purpose and a home. It was wonderful to watch.

Lucie was a character. She had bad manners which I did nothing to stop. She loved chicken. Whenever I was eating chicken she would jump on the table and try to eat off my plate. I would put a piece on the table for her and soon she stopped trying to eat off my plate but would instead sit next to me and tap the table where she wanted the piece of food placed. Really, she did.e She would look at me, tap the table with her paw, and then I would put down the food for her. She also liked to jump up and sit on my shoulder like a pirate’s parrot while I was reading at the table.

Logan grew quickly and due to his antics, I changed his name to “The Loganator.” If something had fallen, been torn apart, or there was just a general ruckus, Logan was usually in the middle of it. I think there were times that the Tots had caused the problem, but Logan, just like a lot of little brothers, was blamed for the damage.

When I found a new job and moved last year, it was hard to leave them all behind. I was very tempted to put Lucie in a box and take her with me but I knew Kat would never let a member of her brood go. Besides, Lucie liked to wander around outdoors in the catnip and eat the green grass, something she could never do in my new apartment.

The other day, Kat let us all know that Lucie was dying. She had cancer and the vet said that there was nothing else to do for her except to make her comfortable. I wanted to see her one last time so I drove over to Gilsum on a beautiful Spring day to see her. Lucie was no longer able to go up and down stairs so Kat had set up her futon in the living room so she could sleep with Lucie and Lucie could lie on the bed and look out on the blue sky and all the activity on the front porch.

I think Lucie remembered me, or I would like to believe she did. She curled up next to me and started to purr as I softly stroked her back. Elliot walked around her gently and Kat said that he had been very attentive to Lucie for the past few weeks, often sleeping next to her during the day. It was evident as I sat there that Lucie’s days of eating grass and being a mom were over.

Lucie died that evening while Kat was at work.

Lucie’s story has touched a large number of people. She came to the hollow just when she was needed and made herself a home. She took on the task of motherhood when she was long past the point of having kittens and, in spite of her slightly sour look, everyone fell in love with her. I am so glad to have known her. We don’t know what the first part of her life was like, but I know her last year and a half was the best.

Pictures - 1 - Raphael and Kylie; 2 - Lucie; 3 - Lucie taking a nap in a sun spot on the deck; 4 - Elliot and Logan

On the Mend and Cooking

It’s the last day of February and I feel like I am finally on the mend. I have high, but probably delusional , hopes for an early Spring. If the turnout at the Farmer’s Market at Cole Gardens in Concord yesterday was any indication, I am not the only one. I bought a beautiful succulent to add to my growing collection of plants. They are so important in the winter to help clean and humidify the air.

I hate that it took so much down time to get over this last bug that hit me. Is this part of getting older or was this just a really bad virus? A lot people that I know were hit hard and I hope I didn’t contribute to the spread of the germs. I tried hard to keep them to myself. I sat in a meeting the other morning and had two boxes of tissues, a large bottle of hand sanitizer, and a plastic bag tied to my chair. I would blow my nose, put the tissue in the bag and then clean my hands before passing out papers. By the end of the meeting my nose was bright red, the bag was full and I had gone through almost a whole box of tissues.

Enough of that, I am done with it. I am moving on.

It really wasn’t a waste. I read a lot. I finished Chris Bohjalian’s new book , Secrets of Eden. It was typical Bohjalian – some good research and a twist at the end. It was about a fictional murder/suicide in Vermont and the impact of the incident on the town.

The other book I have started is A Burning Desire by Kevin Griffin. He takes the concept of the Higher Power in the 12 Step programs and applies it to Buddhist teachings. I am finding the book fascinating and consider it a real find for my recovery and my spiritual path. I may write more about it after I finish reading it.

Last night I spent some time thinking about what are the things that contribute the most to my well being and

health. Number one is music. I have talked about that before in another blog so I won’t wax poetic on the riffs of the blues (which I am listening to right now) or the beauty of cello and oboe. The other things are nature and the joy of a walk in the woods, a warm blanket fresh out of the dryer before bedtime, a heating pad on my stomach, hugs from grandchildren, yoga, massage, and a happy cat. Sometimes the yoga and happy cat go together. This morning I had to include some new yoga moves – Rubbing Boo’s Belly, Scratching Boo’s Ear, and resting in Savasana while getting fingers licked.

Yesterday I also engaged in one of my other great joys. Cooking. I made a great soup for dinner and combined that with some wonderful onion dill rolls I bought at the farmer’s market. I found the recipe in a soup cookbook but once I started chopping I ignored the measurements and just went for it. Here is what I ended up doing.

I heated approx. a tablespoon of olive oil in my mother’s old cast iron soup pot. I love this pot. I remember her using it while I was growing up and I am glad to have it now. It is perfect for cooking soup.

Using my favorite kitchen tool, the Pampered Chef chopper, I diced 2 large onions, 3 large carrots (yes – carrots – I know some of you may be surprised by this) and three large celery stalks. Those all went into the soup pot and I cooked them on medium heat for about five minutes until the onion was translucent. Then I added about 2 tsps or more of curry powder (the recipe called for one tsp and I thought that was incredibly stingy so I just went for it) and four very large cloves of garlic that I had minced (again, the recipe called for two cloves and I thought that was just plain crazy). I let that cook on medium heat for about a minute or so before I added a half a pound of rinsed red lentils, a cup of V8 juice and a quart and a half of vegetable broth. That was all brought to a boil and then covered and simmered for about a half hour or when I couldn’t stand it anymore and wanted to eat. I also seasoned with fresh ground pepper and salt to my personal taste. Along with the rolls, it was a perfect winter meal. There is plenty left for two or three more meals. The recipe said it could be garnished with some sour cream or plain yogurt but I was saving the fat component of the meal for the butter on the rolls. The apartment still smells like onions, garlic and curry.

I am looking forward to getting back to work. My week is structured so that I have a preparation and planning day tomorrow, two days of travel and trainings, a tele-training for the Virginia Coalition on Thursday and then I will be spending Friday and Saturday at a Trauma and Addictions seminar in Boston at Harvard University. As long as the weather cooperates it should be an excellent week.

The Mindful Cowgirl

The next step on this journey towards a healthier me is mindfulness. I approach each day as a to-do list, always living in the next step rather than the one I am currently taking. It is time to slow it down a bit.
Mindful eating is the first key. I eat 2-3 meals a day while sitting at the computer. Up until I stopped eating those McDonald’s biscuits every morning I was eating 1-2 meals a day in the car. My dining table is more of a repository of the day’s mail and my tote bag than it is a place to sit and enjoy a mindful meal. I watched my cat, Boo, this morning. She is a perfect example of mindful eating. She focuses completely on her dish of salmon and gravy with only an occasional turn of her head to make sure that I am not going to step on her tail. When she is done, she cleans her face and paws and goes over to the patio window to check out the birds and squirrels in the trees. She does not insist that I move her dish over to the window so she can be entertained while she dines. She eats first. I realize you may think she does not have the ability to tell me that she wants her dish moved, but, believe me, she made it quite clear this morning that she was not going to let me brush her anymore unless I used the brush she nudged with her nose rather than the one I had in my hand. She is one smart cat and I plan to learn a lot from her.
Mindful eating consists of removing any distractions and focusing completely on the food. Each mouthful is to be chewed until it is completely soft and almost liquid. It is not to be washed down with water, soda, or coffee. Water and other liquids tend to dilute the enzymes needed for good digestion. Therefore, it is best to drink a glass of water 15-30 minutes before eating and then another glass 15-20 minutes after. Putting lemon in the water is a good idea and it is also good to drink it warm or hot. Another key is to put the spoon or fork down between each bite and not pick it up again until the food has been completely chewed and swallowed.
DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA HOW HARD THIS IS????? This morning I got up and did yoga first thing as it has been suggested that yoga be done on an empty stomach. By the time I had breakfast made I was ready to gobble it down. I sat down at the table and started to eat. I wasn’t perfect, but more about the nonjudgmental stance later. I wasn’t always conscious of putting the fork down or chewing thoroughly. However, I found that I felt full faster and did not eat all that was on my plate. If I had been at the computer I would been in auto mode and it all would have been gone before I knew I was full.
The hardest part of this is staying in the moment. Without the distraction of the computer, my to-do list was running through my brain. Brush Boo, clean litter box, vacuum, wipe down the kitchen, fold laundry. My mind was running amok and raising havoc with my mindful eating. What do I do then? I bring myself to the moment and try very hard not to judge myself for having diverged from the plan. If judgment becomes a big part of this journey I will judge myself as a failure before a week is out.
As I was doing yoga this morning I was able to spend some time being mindful of the sensations in my body. I could tune into discomfort, make adjustments, listen to my body and move on to another pose that would release any tension. Occasionally my mind would go back to the to-do list and or to writing this post in my head. Working mindfully, I was able to bring my attention back to my body. I am in this current state of health because I did not listen to my body and it is time to honor all it has done for me by being mindful of its needs. It needs me to pay attention.
I have not always been mindful of my body’s needs. One of the reason my health has gotten to this point is that I took it for granted. I have always been a large woman but it hasn’t really slowed me down until the last two years. I was always able to still do a lot of physical activities that other people of my size would have found too strenuous. Unfortunately, it was like driving a car very hard for a lot of miles without attending to the regular maintenance. I am worn out and I can’t trade myself in for a new model. This is what I have and I need to listen to what it needs in order to help it last for the rest of the trip.
The next challenge is to apply this all to the work day. The hardest part will be the adjustment to my morning routine of eating my breakfast at the computer (or in the car). I plan to eat lunch away from my desk and without distractions. And when I do reach for a piece of chocolate, I will eat it slowly and mindfully.

A Winter's Friendship

There are times when circumstance and people come together in a way that hindsight finds a true blessing. It may be that a common thread seems to be a thorn in the side, but instead turns out to be the first stitch that pieces together a friendship.
In the early spring of 2007, I moved into an old farmhouse in a village in the hills of southwest New Hampshire. It seemed perfect. It was spacious with two large fireplaces and a sun room that looked out on the gardens. There was a small studio sized apartment in the basement and a young woman, Kristen, was living there temporarily while waiting for the weather to warm up so that she could move out into the woods for the summer. Darcy, a nurse, lived upstairs with her two cats, Teddy and Dipstick. Teddy, a large yellow cat, and, Dipstick, a gray tiger with white at the end of her tail, could be heard on many occasions running from one end of the apartment to the other, sounding as if they were bowling over the old pine floors.
I started experiencing difficulties with the landlady early on and soon realized that the property was poorly managed and that repairs were usually done with spit and duct tape, if done at all. If the building was up to code it was probably a code devised pre-electricity. The landlady was also experiencing a deep depression and as the year went on it was becoming increasingly evident that she was not able to manage the property. Her family wanted her to sell, but she refused. This house had been in her family for years and she was reluctant to sell so soon after her mother’s death.
Kristen moved to the woods in May, living in a small campsite at the edge of a pond. She would stop by to see Darcy and I at least once a week and tell us stories of visits from beavers, bear and deer. She had informed the village police and neighbors that she was there and had permission from our landlady to live on the property. In exchange for the site, she was responsible for the mowing and raking on the grounds around the house.
It took a few months for us all to come to together and talk about the difficulties we were having with the landlady, but once the ice was broken we realized that we were each experiencing the same struggles and were not alone in feeling as if there was something very wrong. We agreed to compare notes on conversations because we were often being given different answers to the same questions. We also realized that we needed each other’s support in trying to navigate living in a place where the landlady had few boundaries and made management decisions on a whim.
Unfortunately, the two cats that I had with me when I moved into the apartment had started to act up and behaving very poorly. After weeks of struggling to change their behaviors I realized that I was not going to be able to live there peacefully unless I gave them up. I was determined to fulfill my promise of living there for a full year and I realized that even if I did move, the cats’ behavior would continue and would make finding another place difficult. It was a difficult decision and I mourned their loss.
Shortly before I left for a trip to Tibet in late August the landlady left her home in the barn. It was a few months before she returned to manage the property but she never moved back. Some of the difficulties continued but they were lessened by her absence.
As summer turned cooler and the days became shorter, we started to relax. Kristen would come to Darcy’s apartment and make dinner now and then and one night she invited us to her campsite. We met her at the end of the path with our flashlights and she guided us through the woods, along the edge of the pond and pointed out which rocks to step on to make our way over a stream. Her campsite was wonderful. Everything had been set up to make the least impact on the environment as possible. As we sat around the fire drinking hot apple cider we heard beavers slapping their tails on the surface of the pond. I had hoped to see one of the bears that had visited the campsite previously but our laughter must have warned him away. As Darcy and I walked back to the house, we agreed that it had been a beautiful night.
On still Monday nights we could hear the sound of fiddles coming from the town hall up the road. Kristen would put on a skirt and go contra dancing. I went with her once but found the packed room and the kicking legs more than I could take. However, during the evening I saw Kristen dance with a man and I was struck by the intensity of the energy between them. It was as if they had lit sparklers while they touched.
A few weeks later Kristen talked about the man she had met at the dance and how she couldn’t get him out of her mind. I knew immediately which man she talking about. I encouraged her to make some sort of move but she was unsure.
In early October, Darcy and I started to question how much longer Kristen was going to live in the woods. I was also wondering if I could afford to heat the drafty 250 years old farm house. I had an extra bedroom and I invited Kristen to spend the winter with me, rather than moving back into the cellar. She agreed and as winter moved into New Hampshire the three of us settled into semi-communal living.
It was magical. Kristen was teaching part time and was trying to decide what the next step in her life was going to be. Her biological clock was booming and she had just come out of a bad relationship. I had concerns about the agency I was working for and had just ended a short, but intense relationship. Darcy was still mourning the loss of her last relationship, but was starting to enjoy her freedom. As I look back, we were all just coming to a point of change and it was our friendship that gave us the space and freedom to relax and ease into the next phase of our lives.
Darcy and I nurtured Kristen like an adult daughter and Kristen returned the favor with her joy and desire to feed the people she loves. I would often come home to fresh muffins and chili. There were many nights when Darcy would come down with a magnificent salad of greens, pine nuts, raisins, orange slices, and whatever else she could find and we would sit down to a wonderful home cooked meal and warm bread. Some evenings Darcy would bring a couple of movies and we would sit in the living room, wrapped in comforters and afghans watching a movie. Darcy would do needlework, I would be knitting and Kristen was always working on some project for her pre-school or college aged students. By this time, I had started fostering Mia, the cat the landlady had left behind. Mia would move from one lap to another or come over to play with my yarn.
There were also nights when Bella would come to visit. Bella was Kristen’s and her ex-boyfriend’s Swiss Mountain dog. She would visit for days at a time, much to Mia’s chagrin, and her boisterous love filled the house. I loved to hear her tail hitting the cupboards as she expressed her joy at my homecoming each day.
On New Year’s Eve, Kristen danced with the man from the past summer again. They ended up going to a walk in the snow and then came home and talked until the early hours of the morning. Darcy and I watched as Kristen started to fall in love and began to let go of the hurt of her previous relationship. We knew that Kristen was very serious when she invited her new man over for dinner.
Darcy and I took our roles as surrogate mothers very seriously and spent the evening getting to know this man who was making Kristen happy. She was still struggling with what her future would bring but she was falling in love and trying very hard to live in the moment.
Life moved on and our magical winter had to come to an end. I was feeling like I really needed to move as I had spent a year there and did not think I could afford it much longer. I was very fortunate to find a house sharing situation at reduced rent just before the agency I worked for cut our pay. Kristen stayed in the apartment for another month.
Kristen continued to go to Darcy’s now and then to fix dinner and I drive on over to enjoy whatever delicious meal she serves. It was at one of these meals shortly after Christmas this year that Kristen announced that she was pregnant. It was wonderful news all around. We were ecstatic for her.
A few weeks ago we all met for dinner again and talked about where we had been and what changes had occurred. I was getting ready to move to Concord to be near an exciting new job, Darcy had just put an offer on a condo (she knew she couldn’t spend another winter in an apartment that had a furnace that shot flames out the back whenever it turned o, leaving Dipstick with singed whiskers) and Kristen was glowing from her pregnancy. We laughed as Teddy sat on a stool and hung his legs over the edge in sort of a downward cat yoga pose and we ate asparagus pizza and reminisced.
I know that with all of the changes in our lives that our time together will be less frequent but I don’t think we will ever lose the friendship that grew out of our time on the farm in Nelson. Yesterday, at Kristen’s shower, Darcy and I stood in a circle with Kristen’s friends and family, blessing her and this child. As I stood there I recalled the intensity of emotion that I felt between Kristen and her future partner as they danced on that summer night almost two years ago. A small inner voice told me that it had been the spirit of the child she now carries, urging them forward, asking them to become parents. I know that this child will be born into a life of love because I know that Kristen draws love to her in special ways.
The life quilt of friendship that was sewn together during that time in the farmhouse, through that cold winter, continues. We are each on our different paths but make sure to meet at the crossroads for tea and muffins.