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Tugger Lives! Tugger Lives!

August 27, 2009 - View Single Entry

Tugger the dark gray cat escaped from the Jaws of Travvy on August 13. This was a miracle on the order of loaves and fishes or water turned to wine: that when Susanna said "Drop it!" the Jaws of Travvy opened and Tugger fled up to the hayloft. Tugger was sighted two days later, on Saturday the 15th (by some reckonings the birthday of T. E. Lawrence, my lifelong hero), and said to be OK, albeit with a wound on his side. (Knock off the Christ complex, Tugger. Cats are supposed to have nine lives.) I was immensely relieved by this. As the days went by, however, I saw neither hide nor hair (strange expression, eh wot?) of Tugger and I began to wonder if Tugger really had put in an appearance. Maybe no one had seen him. Maybe they were just saying they'd seen him to make me feel better. I told myself that no one would be this clueless. Sooner or later I would catch on. More to the point, though less likely to be spoken in a cat-dominated court, I didn't feel all that bad. To be sure, I didn't want Travvy to have given Tugger a fatal wound, but on the other hand I am not a cat person, and this particular cat had disgraced his tribe by acting like an idiot. Every Cat's Guide to Dealing with Dogs has a chapter right near the beginning about dogs that aren't to be messed with under any circumstances, and near the top of the list are Alaskan malamutes. Tugger had probably skipped that chapter and cut straight to the one on How to Con Food from Humans.

Anyway, I wanted to see for myself that Tugger was still among the hale and hearty, and day after day I wasn't seeing what I wanted to see. Other people saw Tugger, but not me. This probably had something to do with the fact that I invariably arrived at the barn accompanied by Travvy, who considers all small furry living things a potential food source. Don't be such a gutless wonder, Tugger, I thought. Travvy is tied up. The overwhelming majority of the world is beyond the radius of his tie.

No Tugger. Theo, however, was all over the place. Chowing down on the shelf under the window, lounging on one of the Adirondack chairs.

Yesterday morning I was in one of the stalls, collecting empty feed pans. I heard yeowling. I looked around, then I looked up. Peering down at me from the opening that we drop hay through was Tugger. Yeow! Yeoww! Yeowwwww!

I was ridiculously glad to see his well-fed cat face. I climbed the ladder to the hayloft. Hiya, Tugger, where ya been? Along the ribs on his left side, well concealed by fur, was a rough scabby line two or three inches long. It didn't seem sore, which is to say that Tugger didn't screech or claw me when I touched it, and it didn't seem to go much deeper than the skin. Stay away from the dog, jerk, I said. You used up at least two lives on that one.

I climbed back down the ladder. Tugger faded back into the hayloft. Travvy, outside, was oblivious. I think.

Senator Ted

August 26, 2009 - View Single Entry

The senior senator from my state died last night. This comes as no big surprise: Senator Kennedy has been fighting brain cancer for a year and a half, and when he didn't attend his sister's funeral a couple of weeks ago, I had a hunch the end was closing in. He was diagnosed with brain cancer not long before my father was. My father chose not to go the biopsy and treatment route; he said he was learning all he needed to know from the news reports about Senator Kennedy. My father was a lifelong and active Democrat from a Republican family. He definitely relished having something in common with the senior senator from our home state, even if that something was a terminal illness. My father died a little more than three months after his diagnosis, aware of the world and getting about almost up to the end. State-of-the-art treatment gave Senator Kennedy a year and a half. My father was 10 years older than Kennedy. He felt he'd pretty well wrapped things up. Kennedy still had work to do. I hope he managed to get it done.

Edward M. Kennedy was first elected to the Senate in 1962, when I was 11 years old. He was 30, the minimum age required to serve in the U.S. Senate. Of course, as his Democratic primary opponent, Edward McCormack, pointed out, if his name had been just Edward Moore, instead of Edward Moore Kennedy, he wouldn't have been elected. JFK was in the White House, RFK was attorney general; Teddy needed a job. He defeated McCormack in the primary and George Cabot Lodge in the general election (I ransacked my memory for the name of his Republican opponent and finally came up with Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr.). He got the job.

He's been a phenomenally good senator all these years. The historical record will remember that when it's mostly forgotten Chappaquiddick and his multitudinous personal weaknesses. I like to think that if he could write his own obituary, it would say something like this: "In lieu of flowers, please devote some time, money, and/or energy to making sure that comprehensive health-care reform succeeds in this country."

And you know, that's what I most admire about the guy. He never had to worry about money, but he never forgot that millions upon millions of us, in Massachusetts and across the country, have to worry about money all of the time, and that it saps our strength and limits our imaginations every day of our lives. Adieu, Senator Ted. Your journey's done, and you've left us a well-blazed trail to follow. Here's hoping we have the courage to keep moving forward.

Fair

August 23, 2009 - View Single Entry

I'm almost certainly going to regret it by midweek, because I've got one horrendous crunch of a deadline coming up, but I spent all day at the fair, escorting or escorted by Travvy.

We showed up early to help Karen Ogden set up her space under the trees near the ferris wheel. This was quite an undertaking -- imagine setting a stage with a very complicated set. Fortunately Karen is well organized, and several of us were helping. The first step was enclosing our area -- a trial-size space with a smaller section for us, our dogs, and their crates -- in snow fencing. Then setting up a small tent, table, and various signage and resource materials. Then setting up the agility obstacles: agility was first on the demonstration schedule. Now you understand why Karen drives around in a good-size Tundra pickup and hauls a trailer for special events.

I brought Travvy's crate, which involved moving all the piles of books, bumper stickers, printed materials, newspapers, and half-forgotten mail that have accumulated on top of it onto the nearby chair. Travvy stayed in the truck. Now I can't remember why I didn't leave Travvy at home; it had rained overnight, but the rain had stopped, so I could have left him on the deck. He got a little stressed and started chewing on the driver-side head rest, It doesn't look nearly as bad as the one on his side, but it's heading in that general direction. Turned out he had serious business to do in the woods. When set-up was nearly complete, we went home so Trav and I could take a walk and I could fortify myself with tea and cereal.

Back at the fair, Trav and I went over to register for the dog show, which would be held in the pulling ring. While we were out in the open, the sun came out of the haze and the temp shot up about 20 degrees. The humidity was, as usual, somewhere close to 100%. Travvy was pretty good considering all the dogs in the area, and especially considering the ones whose owners weren't paying much attention to what they were doing. We hung out at Karen's camp, taking occasional strolls around the grounds, mostly sticking close to the ring where the draft horse show was going on. The mounted classes were all bareback, and the riders were having way too much fun. Some of those horses looked about as drafty as Allie. Maybe we can crash the party next year.

Alaskan malamutes come near the top of the Working Group list. Travvy and I were ready to enter the ring, only first I couldn't see where the entrance once because it was so jammed with people, and then some people wouldn't move themselves and their dogs out of range. Finally we made it in. Trav was the only malamute -- which I suspected he would be, seeing as last year there were none -- so he got a blue, despite joshing by my judge and ringmaster buddies that they thought he'd get an honorable mention. (If the judge doesn't think the sole entrant in a one-dog class deserves a blue, they can give it a red or a yellow or an honorable mention.) We trotted our stuff. Trav was very good, but he couldn't quite figure out what he was doing there. In the Best of Group class, a judge appeared out of nowhere and tried to inspect his teeth. He snapped at her. My bad: I hadn't expected a teeth inspection so I hadn't prepared him for it. That might have got us disqualified but maybe not: the competition was very keen, including Travvy's classmate Sailor the Great Dane, who has won ribbons in serious AKC dog shows (which this one wasn't). The Bernese mountain dog won best in group.

Later we participated in the Rally O demonstration. Trav was fine once we got going on the obstacles, but getting his attention before we got started was a, ahem, challenge. He was fascinated by the A-frame agility obstacle, which by this point was stowed at one end of the "ring." Then he was fascinated by smells in the grass. Our second run was better. Given how well he dealt with distractions and other dogs, though, I think I'm not totally nuts to be taking him to those trials next month.

Breaking camp at the end of the day went very smoothly. We left before everything was stowed in Karen's truck and trailer because we still had barn chores to do. We stopped at home first. I fed Trav his supper and called Cynthia to say I'd be late to writers' group because I really needed to shower before I went into any human-inhabited dwelling. I left Trav on the deck when I drove off to Cynthia's. When I returned, well after nine, Trav wasn't on the deck. Uh-oh. After a moment's thought, I dismissed the possibility that he'd jumped the gate onto the stairs and taken off. Then I noticed he was inside. Uh-oh again: had he caused a ruckus and the neighbors put him inside? Then I noticed that the screen was no longer fully attached to its frame. Trav had made a dog door of it. And I was so hoping to get through the summer without a trip to the window and door shop.

He hadn't committed any mischief inside, though. Both wastebaskets were upright and full up.

The Day No Wash Would Dry

August 22, 2009 - View Single Entry

All my tank tops and muscle Ts were in the laundry -- this isn't a huge number, maybe a dozen or so, but it's usually enough to get me through the hot spells -- and most of this month wearing anything with sleeves has been unthinkable, no matter how light the fabric, so yesterday morning it was off to the laundromat. By 11 o'clock all the wash was hung out. By 7 only half of it was dry enough to put away. On a dry, sunny, breezy day even jeans dry inside of three hours (not that I'd have denim anywhere close to my skin these days: even cutoffs are too hot), so you get the idea. "Humid" doesn't do it justice. We're lucky the sun has been hazed over a lot of the time; if it wasn't, the air might have boiled.

This morning was looking like more of the same, but now there's some sun and some breeze, so I've hung the damp stuff out for a second day.

The thing is, Travvy's going in the dog show tomorrow, and I've had it in mind to give him a bath today. What if the dog doesn't dry in time?

Volunteers

August 22, 2009 - View Single Entry

This was inspired by an op-ed in today's Boston Globe, about how "voluntarism" was up despite (or maybe because of? When your hours have been cut or you've been laid off, you've got more time to volunteer) the economic hard times.

Trouble is with an awful lot of (very part-time, unpaid) volunteering is that it's aimed at mitigating the damage that's created by other people who are working full-time and often getting paid very well. To me this is like trying to drain the basement and repair the damage while water is still spraying out of a broken pipe. Let's hear more about what these volunteers are doing. And while we're at it, how about an acknowledgment that volunteers alone can't fix the current mess that the bankers, brokers, and their well-bought politicians have got us into, and we aren't going to stop the well-funded Big Insurance/Big Pharma machine that is not only spending big-time to lie about health-care reform, it's also hiring thugs to disrupt the discussion. That old bumper sticker simplified things, but the point is well taken: What if the schools got everything they need, and the military had to hold bake sales to build a bomber?