Cats

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Island Blog – The Fly, the Mouse, the Rat and School the Next Day

An eclectic combo, I’ll give you that. They all arrived today, slotting neatly into my log. I should, perhaps, give some background. It begins with the mouse. For decades I have dealt with mice indoors, scrabbling through the scuts of plaster behind the walls, making innapropriate homesteads in my halloween of a loft, helping themselves to lagging, which no respectful neighbour would ever consider, and diddling through and over my frypan cupboard. The last is unacceptable. However, I am no killer and that’s the tricky bit, but there is also in me a refusal against invasion. I have seen myself, in my wild pioneer dream, as a woman who would stand against invaders. They weren’t mice, of course, but big fighty men with bludgeons, no compassion and with a determination to take over the homestead, one fixed lightly down in a rickety space where wolves and bears, snakes and marauders were as regular as clockwork and the neighbours 20 miles away on horseback.

There was a housefly, no, two, on my window, and they aren’t the only ones to get stuck against glass, banging themselves into failure and refusing to be caught and freed. It’s late for them, so they are slow, but a slow fly is not slow at all. the gymnastics are impressive. I know they will die out there in the torrent of cold rain, the freeze of the night, but, if I can, I will ding about with a tea towel, catch them soft and let them go. Not so the mice. Oh, I have done, in the past, long past, humane traps and they are a laugh because unless you take the sweating and terrified mouse at least 3 miles away from your home, their home, they just return. Poison is not an option, although I tried it once when the mouse invasion was so alarming as to be overwhelming, and the way it takes them is slow and horrific. So, I set a trap in my frypan cupboard.

The first morning, I can barely look. It takes hours before I can brace my pioneer self, she who has seen dead everything, including humans in this wild place, and check. Clean, gone. I am no killer but and but again. This is my space, not yours. The next check was a little easier, the one after, ok and now it is normal. I am not immune to it, to finding a life gone, but I am easier in my skin. It will go on because they are hungry and it is winter beginnings. And I know this place. I know that creatures will come in to the warmth. I remember it when we lived wilder, on Tapselteerie, when it was normal for me, for my kids, to welcome in the coldings. We couldn’t save them, but we gave food and warmth for a while. We didn’t have rats in the house, and. I am thankful, but they were in the byre and the barns. I have only met one once and its confidence terrified me.

I was staying overnight with a schoolfriend on her parents farm. I was under 12 and not a good guest in that I had no experience of country life at that point and had yet to connect with the wild in me. In short, I was scared of it all, the confidence of my friend, the way she swung from ropes in the barn, danced among the pigs, marched confidently into a map of cows, pushing at their flanks when they growled at her, shouting words and laughter. I was put to bed in a cold room with damp sheets and the dark was immediate when the light was turned off, although I had my wee torch. I lay there, tried to sleep and it took ages. I felt something heavy move over my feet, jerked up awake, flicked on my torch and the movement stopped. Two bright eyes clocked mine. A big rat looked at me from the end of my bed, I felt it’s weight on my feet. A second, and it was gone. I yelled. People say they scream, but they don’t. They yell. Someone adult came. I wan’t to go home, I sobbed. Insisted, despite reassurances that the rat had gone. My dad came. We drove the miles home. It was almost morning. I was never asked about my trauma, only told, in a kindly way, that I was over reacting.

School on Monday was interesting.

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Island Blog – Cats, Strong Women and Learning

The cats greet me at dawn, four of the five. I’m still working on the fifth, a nervous lad, a rescue like all the others. He is coming around, inch by nervous inch and I am hopeful that one day we will be friends. As I observe these cats I notice how independent they are, how individual and how they take no shit. Each does what it wants to do regardless of my plan, my agenda. I find that I like this sassy attitude even as one of them escapes my palm to leap atop the fridge freezer and to stare down at me. That’s what they do. They stare down at me. Ah, I think, I can learn a lot from you up there all lofty and dismissive and I rather wish I had adopted that attitude as a young woman. You can watch me all you like, try to reel me in, but if I don’t fancy your reeling in tactic I will distance myself and say not a word.

The South African women I have met have a similar attitude but they do use words, and confidently. They also will take no shit. If they encounter injustice, rudeness or inappropriate behaviour or just someone getting too close or sounding too patronising, they will round, talons out, mouths full of retaliation, minds confident, bodies strong and assertive. They sigh me too, a bit, because they show me who I always wanted to be, but wasn’t. Unlike in my youth, these women were taught to be singular and independent, their lives required it for living in Africa is real, no benefits, no guaranteed safety net, no easy path. There be dragons. In the UK it is more softly softly, girls are pink princesses requiring protection from all the boy stuff or from big decisions and these girls should behave themselves, wielding nothing more dangerous than a mop. At least that was how it was in my girlhood. I don’t think it’s the same now, but unless difficulties are encountered and imaginative practicality taught them at an early age, how can they learn? Here, where most need to face down dangers and restrictions, independent thinking is perfectly normal. If a woman wants something she must fight for it, and with her claws out. I like that and it thinks me.

Looking back on my own wifelife, there were plenty dangers and restrictions and, at the time I probably did mewl and whine as I encountered them but there was only me facing me during those times and I had to overcome my mewls and whines and to get the hell on with it. I guess I learned imaginative practicality on the hoof. If I didn’t sort something it would just stay unsorted and I had pride enough in myself to leap into a higher place and to look down on it with assessing eyes, my mind whirring. Living in a remote place, there was nobody to call on, not while himself was all at sea and guests required answers and solutions. If my kids were in trouble, I was the one to untrouble the trouble and I am proud to say that, in the main, I did just that. If some disaster struck or something collapsed or dissolved, I had no manual to read beyond the one inside my own head. I grew tough even when exhausted and overwhelmed because tough challenges are character building and I wanted to think of myself as a can-do solution oriented woman, no matter the restrictions I lived with. I gradually found room to move, to make space for myself and found, to a degree, my voice.

But I was also raised as a traditional girl, one who was told how a young lady should behave, all mannerly and subservient, all politeness, acquiescence, and femininity. In my time, women did not rise above their husbands, good lord no. Women who did were labelled bossy, man-like, loud, selfish and more, were required to speak with a husband’s opinion, to quietly lay down to his rules and restrictions and never to make a public fuss about it, although it was acceptable to talk with other women (gossip) in order to unburden the angst. As long, that is, that we go to another room to perform this unburdening lark leaving the men to roll their eyes at the pretty palaver of women as they knock back their brandies. A man who has too much to drink of a night is just, well, normal, such a lad, hugely entertaining, let’s put him to bed and cosset him as he sobers up. We’ll tease him at breakfast. Whereas a woman who drinks too much is a lush, disgusting, badly behaved and should be dismissed from the party in a ball of shame and rejection. No breakfast for her.

Confusion reigns in such a womanly life unless that is we can learn from cats and from other strongly independent women who will stand their ground until they fall over and if they are labelled as unfeminine, so be it. I have admired such women and learned from them over the years and I am so thankful to them. There weren’t many, t’is true, but when I found them I observed the way they quietly or loudly held their ground and I took the lesson given to heart. I learned to be not aggressive but assertive, to study my own mind and to put it in order. What do I believe about this? What is my position on that? Although I still step back when a strong man steps forward, for goodness sake, I am learning how to unlearn this, to question this presumed privilege and not to falter at any ensuing male startlement. I just hope the young pink princesses of today learn too, and a whole lot quicker than I did because the world is changing and the need for strong leadership in women, without the black cloud of bias, has never been more important.

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Island Blog – Tuning, Turning and Today

I awake this morning knowing that I have been out of tune with life for a bit. I know it because, on awakening, I feel in tune once more. Instead of a night of mares and violent interlopers and slugging through the days quite certain that my internal cheerleaders have downed their pompoms and left for Ibiza, I floated inside the arms of sleep all the way up to 3.30 am. Going quietly downstairs to make a cup of tea, I noticed how dark it now is. Only last week, it seems, it was light enough to show me the way. Perhaps, I say to myself, it is the turning of the seasons that has set me at a discord; perhaps it is the unwinding of lockdown and the threat of incoming, be it friendly or hostile. This bubble has lived us pleasantly since March 16th, weeks passing like minutes, moons waxing, waning and all days are Today. We needed nothing more.

Of course, the current subject matter of care home, separation, guilt, grief, loss and fear may also have colluded in my needing a re-tune. Time is the best one for that, but we are impatient; I am impatient. When I might expect to back on my feet instantly, life is telling me Stay Down Awhile, you ridiculous woman, but I don’t take kindly to being told. I battle on, expecting my mood to lift with my feet as I troughle round the daily do’s and grow furious when it stays limp as old lettuce.

Trusting, however, as I do, in the spirit world, the one I cannot see, touch or control, softens my wires and loosens keys that have gone rigid of late. The tunes I played sounded like a mess of angry cats; hurtful even to my own ears, going nowhere, no cadence, no major lift or minor bend, just a racket. From this morning, I can hear the lilt once more of harmony, melody, flow and the relief runs through me like warm honey. Nothing has changed. All will go ahead, in its own time, at its own speed and all will be well. I know this now, even as I know that discordant days will come again as we make the journey to a new place and time. However, knowing this doesn’t disturb the melody for I have learned that life is not a set piece of music, but, instead, one that changes over and over again. All I need to do is allow it all to happen, to accept the sad times, to sit with them, say Hallo, and wait for them to move away.

Times like these we learn from, if we notice, stop, say Hallo and wait in trust. I wish I had understood this as a young woman instead of turning from the darkness, fighting the demons with sickeningly inadequate weapons, thinking that if I sang loud enough the melody would find me once again. So much time wasted in ignorance. But I am thankful to understand it now because I do not believe in the bad press; I know the nightmares are just unpleasant dreams and that all days are, simply, today.

Which, I am reminded, is Winnie the Pooh’s favourite day of all.

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Island Blog 146 Travelling Light

suitcaseAs I pack my bag for the trip to the Reader Room on Skye, I meet all sorts of thought tangles. What to take, what not to take and in which suitcase. The big stripey one or the smaller spotty one? Both have noisy wheels and both weigh too much empty. I won’t need much, will I? Just jeans and tops, a warm jumper, walking boots, books, notes, wash things, face paint, a frock for the night, leggings. The smaller spotty one will do. Until it won’t.

Travelling light is a dream of mine, almost a passion. I want to be light and flexible, easy to move along please, to glide through doorways, over metal bridges without needing CPR on the other side. I want to fit into that space the huge-suitcased lumberers leave between themselves and the dangerous side of the pavement or platform. To scurry, hurtle, dash with momentum and forward thrust. I want to be at my destination before half of these goodly folk have reached the ticket barrier. I catch earlier trains that way, denying myself the takeaway coffee, the creamy bun. I don’t push or shove. I am perfectly respectful of the Overladen, but my constantly working mind maps out the fast route and my feet take me on. I don’t mind queuing at all and must be the only Brit who doesn’t. I just factor it into my dash to wherever I’m going, and speed up where necessary when momentum is paused.

Travelling light, I tell myself, is a state of mind, a decision. Taking too many changes of clothing, just in case, comes from a place of fear. Will I have the ‘right’ thing to wear? Will I be too cold or too hot? Have I the right shoes? All of this is dithering and arrives me laden, out of breath, hot, bothered, and with a load of unnecessary vestments, not one of which gets beyond crumpling itself in the dark depths of my suitcase. But we all do this dithering, if we’re honest.

When I first decided to travel light, it was to a funeral in Yorkshire. I just needed the gear for the church, and mufti. We said bye bye to the kids, minder, collies and cats and left Tapselteerie. It was coming into York that we discovered we had left the cases in the front hall. As our life had always been lived by making good decisions quickly in the face of adversity, we dived into a dress shop and bought this and this and that, then shoes, and arrived at the funeral with the labels still attached. Nobody cared. It was enough that we had made the journey.

The second time was when I went South for a different occasion, on my own. This time, I did have my lightly packed suitcase with me, too heavy even when empty, and handed it over to the nice Easy Jet steward at check-in. I arrived, my case did not. Mum and I dashed to Sainsbury’s, picked this and this and yes, shoes, and off I went to my date. Nobody cared. It was enough that I had made the journey. My case arrived home ahead of me, minus a handle, rendering it completely pointless.

It has happened since, the careful planning, folding, fitting into a small space, all that I think I might need, in case of shipwrecks, strandings, sudden invitations to a military ball, a funeral, a heatwave in October, that my luggage has abandoned me. I have always found a laugh in it, after my initial fish wife impression. I have borrowed clothes I would never buy, applied make-up all wrong for my small pale face, shared toothpaste, boots and even underwear, but, most of all, I was given the chance to find my sense of humour and to lean on it as my support. In the absence of things, I found people, and people can rise over things every time. It’s boundless, the human spirit, warm and strong and constant. Their handles don’t fall off, and in the main, they do what they say they’ll do, and much, much more.

But we forget don’t we, as we live out our lives as islands.  We think we must have everything we need with us, just in case.  We imagine, with horror, the disaster of being cold, or hot, or lost, or stranded, of our train/ferry/plane being late or worse, cancelled, and yet, in all of those circumstances I have found human warmth and friendship.  I have found team spirit, good attitude and kindness.  In times of trouble, we look to each other.  Sometimes we might consider doing that every day, troubled or not.  It might make us less fearful.  We might engage in sharing ourselves with others until it’s easy to do, natural, uncomplicated.  All of us are alone, but we can travel side by side.

Now I’m going back to fret about packing, about the ferry being cancelled due to gale force 22, the bus breaking down on the way north, and, finally, me arriving on the wrong day.

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Island Blog 5

Did I tell you I cook and clean for Old Harry?

Well, I am now, and I do.

The job sort of came to me.  I wasn’t looking for work, but Old Harry has looked after me and my family for over 35 years, doing odd jobs and bringing those little bits and pieces to us when we were without them.  A short length of roofing felt, perhaps, or a special size of bicycle screw, or a bit of wire fencing to block up a hole in the fence.

Well, since his old wife died, he has had to fend for himself in a kitchen he never knew existed.  He did outdoors and she did indoors and that was that for a whole lifetime.  So, Old Harry found someone to cook meals for him, freeze them and deliver once a week.  There was a bit of washing, a bit of cleaning too.  When one cook left him, he came to tell me and I said, quite without thinking, I’ll do it Harry.  For you.

And I do.

This morning I was supposed to go over with supplies, clean washing and my rubber gloves for the cleanup which is never much as Old Harry was a Regimental Sergeant Major in the war and still lives that way.  But, it was raining again, cats and dogs so I knew Harry, whose work is all outside, remember, would be stuck at home and not wanting a merry little cleaner like me moving him around whilst I cleaned.  So, I stayed home and cooked extra meals for him instead, which is timely as we are off to see our new grand-daughter in London on Wednesday and I will be away for ten days helping out.  I will still keep up my blog, though, so no worries there.

I’m bushed now, though.  Time for a walk in the Fairy Woods.  I’ll tell you what I find tomorrow.