Lost Kitty

I've been going through an emotional tumult the past week.  My kitty cat of six years, Juliet, has disappeared.  I don't know where she is, if she is hurt (or worse....God forbhid), or where to even start looking for her.  I feel helpless, and that is such an awful feeling.

I grew up on a farm out in the country, and while growing up I had tons of cats as pets.  I think at one point in time we had over 20 cats that lived on our farm and more than a handful of those cats were "my" cats.  So I am not new to the ordeal of losing a pet and the grieving process that goes along with it. 

But there's something different about it this time around. 

Don't get me wrong, I am trying to stay positive and hold fast to the idea that Juliet will come home. Yet as each day goes by my hope wanes little by little.  Juliet was mine and Dean's first pet.  She was with us through our years at WSU, through moving into our first house, and through our first year of marriage.  We taught her how to play fetch with a little toy mouse, and spied on her as she would sit in the window and squack at the birds outside. 

I'm reminded of her absence everywhere I look.  Her half empty food dish, the empty guest bed that she would nap on, even the litter box that I haven't had to clean for a week.  I never realized how big a void one little cat could leave in someone's life....but that is glaringly apparent now.

My sadness sits just under the surface, every now and then overtaking me.  Everytime we take the dogs out for a walk I find myself scanning the park for a glimpse of her brown fur, or the sound of her tiny jingle bell collar.  I'm hoping and praying she finds her way home. 

Until then, I'll allow myself to feel, to go through the grieving process.  It's really the best way to heal.

Are we ever satisfied?

Last week the hubby and I spent some time outside doing yard work.  We mowed, edged, raked, watered, did just about everything we could think of to get the front and backyards looking in tip top shape.  As the sun set that Thursday evening we sat on the porch, admiring our hard work, and taking silent satisfaction in a job well done.


Later the next day, we started devising a plan for spring.  We talked about where to plant new grass, when we should fertilize, and the prospect of planing new bushes and trees.  The momentary satisfaction of the work we had accomplished the day before was soon forgotten.  Our minds were moving ahead to progress.  To change.


Satisfaction is such a fleeting concept.  When we have it, we feel complete and accomplished.  When we don't have it, we're unfulfilled and striving to find a way to make our yearnings a reality. 


As humans we get bored.  We long for change.  This causes dissatisfaction to a certain degree.  But is it possible to keep that feeling of satisfaction around, or is it inevitable that before long we are back to feeling unsettled?


Small moments of satisfaction can go a long way, but if you're like me, your mind is constantly running down the list of endless To-Do's, wondering how there can possibly be enough time for everything.  This is overwhelming, and for me personally leads to feelings of dissatisfaction.


I feel like we are constantly bombarded with messages of "bigger and better."  We are being subliminally coached into thinking that what we have is never good enough, and that we should be making steps toward change.


Change can be refreshing.  Sometimes even a necessity.  But there is something to be said for staying put, for accepting things the way they are and being content.  Is it possible to feel this way always, or are we conditioned to eventually cave in and search for ways to further increase our satisfaction? 

I suppose I don't have definitive answers to these questions, and maybe that's alright.  Maybe it's up to each of us to find our own personal limits, and once those limits are met, our own personal satisfaction will be, too.      

Urban Legends

My fascination with urban legends began when I discovered the wonderful collection of stories by Alvin Schwartz.  Perhaps some of you remember "Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark," "More Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark," and "Scary Stories 3: More Tales to Chill Your Bones."  In these collections Schwartz gathered a wonderful assembly of urban legends, some in their original forms, some rewritten, and presented his readers with some truly classic stary tales.

 

As a kid I never really paid attention to where these tales came from, but recenly as I was flipping through the indexes of the books I found that Schwartz made a point to not only include American folklore in these books, but also legends from other countries.  

Urban legends, in my mind, are cautionary tales.  They are vehicles for lessons on how our lives should be lived, and the sorts of situations and people that should be avoided.  I love these stories for their ambiguous nature, which in a way is odd because as a writer I have always been taught that details and establishing time and place are imperative.  But urban legends don't have to have a setting.  You don't have to know the time of year, or the backgrounds of the characters involved.  These are probably the only types of stories where you can get away with that.  Of course, this goes along with the notion that urban legends were commonly used as a vessel for passing down lessons.  In that respect, because the stories were being told over and over again, year after year, things like place, time, and setting weren't really a necessity.  They could be adjusted and changed as often as the story was told. 

In urban legends, the endings are always the best part.  Whether it's the young couple finding the bloody hook hanging from their car door, the girl discovering a man with a knife hiding in her backseat, or the babysitter discovering that the mysterious phone calls she is receiving are coming from a room upstairs, it's the endings that pack the punch.

In terms of whether there are any truth to these stories, the answers are somewhat vague.  It's always customary for the storyteller to claim that a particular story happened to "a friend of a friend," and so on.  For me, this adds an irresistable charm to the tales.  There may not always be conclusive evidence to prove that a story is true, but if it's told with enough conviction a seed is planted in the mind of the person listening to the story.  Because there is always the question of "what if....?"  

Again, the mind comes into play.  Regardless of what we know, regardless of evidence to the contrary, there is always a possibility that the unfortunate occurances that befall the victims in urban legends can happen to us if we are not careful.  And of course, it's very easy for us to believe that when we are home alone with the lights out, and hear strange noises coming from the upstairs.