Holding Pattern

Last Friday, my cat Ray somehow managed to fracture his jaw in two places while I was at work. When I came home, he was drooling, and I noticed blood on his paws. I brought him to the Vet ER and have been on an emotional roller coaster since then. Thank god my mom was already planning on visiting. While Ray had surgery, we painted my kitchen.



What was supposed to be straightforward surgery was complicated by extensive gum damage, and the four pins in his mouth are moving. I was already now four thousand dollars in debt, and additional treatments the vets suggested were experimental. My mom came back to Portland just a day after she left to help me figure out what to do. We visited Ray, who despite a slipping jaw and a plate on his mouth,was in good spirits. We brought him home, and turned my office into a giant cat cage, moving out all of the furniture that might tempt him to leap.

While I went back to work the next day, my mother spent the day painting my furniture and playing Ray lullabyes. I was suspicious when she told me how much he enjoyed them, but now that I have witnessed first hand the effect on him, I am a believer.

I came home from work yesterday, and for the first time in over two years, there was someone home. Mom had made a fire and was in the middle of making dinner. My apartment felt like a home, and I am starting to think that there may be some benefits to the schedule that Ray's care has now put me on. I will need to be home a lot more, and I think it will be a good way to more fully settle in to my apartment and new life here.

Meanwhile, I have a new found empathy for parents of babies. I was up four times last night with Ray. Having slept all day, he was unhappy about being shut in my office. It felt like a luxury to be annoyed with him, when I didn't even think he'd be alive two days ago.

Keep your fingers crossed for my 16 year old cat. I have such admiration for his resiliency, and I think if any cat can make it through this, he can.

Victim

I have been captured hostage by my own hormones, they have taken the reasonable part of me away and left a dangerous woman who looks exactly like me in my place. The small part of me that remains and knows it is only pms that is making me hate everything and everyone today is really hoping this doesn't last longer than a day.

Shattered

This morning as I was sitting at the reference desk, I noticed that it is really time for me to change the display in the children’s section, not only because it’s been up for awhile, but also because the animals I made out of leaves don’t accurately reflect the season. It doesn’t feel like fall anymore.

I thought some paper snowflakes might look nice. I haven’t made them in years, so I decided to practice. I was in the middle of making a snowflake when a couple came up to me and asked me if I could help them find websites with videos of live crimes. When I asked for an example of what they were talking about, they described a video they had seen of a man being decapitated.

I am really tired of other people bursting the bubble I work so hard to create. I am disappointed with people in general.

A Barstool Broke My Heart

A few months ago, I had a terrible day. The kids at my former workplace were out of control, lifting chairs above their heads and throwing them at eachother. There wasn't an administrator in the building to help me deal with the situation. I left work really upset. I got home, only to discover I'd left my keys at work. I was locked out of my apartment for a few hours. All I wanted to do was take a bath and cry. When I finally got into my building, I discovered that the bathtub had backed up and was filled with rusty water. I went out to get some draino and ran into a garage sale, where I found a vintage fur coat from the '30's for $5. It seemed like the perfect ending to a really bad day.

Today, things have happened in the reverse order. I woke up and was delighted to discover that I'd slept 12 hours. It was sunny, and I decided to go out for an adventure. I walked by Rerun, and found the exact type barstool I have been looking for $24. Everything else I've liked has been about $300. I asked if it would be okay to buy it and pick it up when I could get someone to haul it for me, and was assured that wasn't a problem. I paid for it, and continued on my nice day. I went out for great Italian food, bought myself some flowers, and went for about a five mile walk. I came home, and contacted K. to see if she could run me up the street to pick up the stool.

It wasn't out front when I arrived, but I assumed it was because they'd put it away once I bought it. Instead, it was gone because they'd sold it to someone else an hour or so later. They said someone must have taken the sold tag off, and that this had happened in the past.

What I want to know is if the same thing had happened in the past, why did it happen again? Is it that hard to remember you've already sold a piece of furniture? Or to move it into another room for an hour or so?

Laid back people of Portland, I love that you are friendly. I love if I go out by myself, you talk to me. I love that you say hello and ask me how I am doing where ever I go. This didn't happen in Seattle.

But when it comes to doing business, I wish you'd be a little more uptight and a lot more professional. I've had a crappy ending to a really good day.