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The Dreaming

Last night I dreamt very clearly about Bernadette coming home. She was lurking at the door and we had to lure her in with treats. She was perfectly healthy but without her collar. Once inside, she was a happy purring girl just like she’s always been. I held her in my arms and cried with happiness. That’s all I remember.

Why is my mind torturing me like this? What do these dreams mean? Is it just my wishful thinking? Are they prophetic? Is it a message to me from beyond that Bernie is OK?

If only dreams would come true…

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Bernadette the Great Striped Huntress

I’d say it’s clear that we’ve lost Bernie. I’ve already written about her in this post, so I won’t go through that again. That post is her eulogy – as much as it pains me to say that.

I still hold a tiny bit of hope that she’s still ok, maybe lost and being someone else’s feral cat. But I just don’t know. I’ve been missing her intensely since we returned from our trip. I guess I’d been hoping that she’d magically turn up while we were gone. Silly, I know. But she didn’t and it’s been about 6 weeks at this point.

I’ve been trying to console myself with the thought that if it was something bad it was quick and if she’s lost there’s someone feeding her.

That’s some hard candy consolation, I can tell you.

Bernie was a very sweet girl who made my life brighter. She will always have a special place in my heart. Bye, my girl. I miss you. :-(

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Bernadette we’ll miss you ALWAYS

Well, it’s been 17 days. I guess we’ve got 2 cats now. I’m not one to give up easily, but what else can I do? Either she’s dead or she’s lost. I can’t help either way. It sucks sucks sucks.

For a small cat, she ate a lot. I’ve noticed a big reduction in kibble consumption. I always said she had a worm. I miss my lil grey striped huntress. When I told Andy about all this, he reminded me that she used to follow Hobbes around when she was a baby lurking in our yard at Derrydown. It took us weeks to get her tame enough to come into the house and be petted.

She got her name from a cartoon, naturally. There is a small grey stray cat in Animaniacs called Rita who was always singing. We didn’t want to call her Rita because Andy’s family had several pets named Rita, so we decided to use the voice of Rita, Bernadette Peters. So, our tiny little cat got a very big name.

Bernadette never did give up her claim to being feral, right up to the last time I saw her – having dinner on the back porch. She would hesitate before coming into the house every time. It took a minimum of two tries for her to enter. If there was anything amiss, forget it. When she was outdoors, we couldn’t get near her. She’d run away like she’d never seen us before. I’m sure it was a game, but at least part of it was her feral roots. She’d have her dinner al fresco much of the time if the weather was good. Despite all this, she’d still come inside most nights and cuddle up on the couch and purr purr purr. What a sweet little cat!

This ended up being Bernie’s eulogy. And I am so very sad for that.

Thanks to everyone for all the support.

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The Blind Meets the Deaf

Years ago, when Dave was recently blind and trying to get his life together, he was living at these halfway house type of apartments down on the South side of Atlanta – Forest Park, I believe. (It might have been 1990? Not sure.)

I was there one day for some reason and there was a knock on the door. Dave went to answer the knock and I hear him say “Hello? Hello?”. So I stuck my head around the corner to see what was going on. I see on the porch, this tall black guy who is looking at Dave and signing for all he’s worth. Dave’s eyes still looked ok since he’d not been blind long, so apparently the deaf guy didn’t realise that Dave was blind…

Hilarity ensues. After a moment of observing this and trying not to fall down laughing, I tell Dave that there’s a deaf guy at the door… He laughed so hard! I went to the deaf guy and mimed “blind” and pointed at Dave and then the deaf guy gets it and goes away. He didn’t seem nearly as amused by this whole exchange as we did, but whatever.

We laughed about that so many times over the years. :-) I love the memories of Dave that make me laugh.

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Drama done

For the most part, anyway. The drug addict is in treatment and all that’s left is to help the family with getting the rental house cleaned out and presentable for the end of the lease.

I’m very very pleased that the person checked him/herself into the hospital. I sincerely hope that s/he gets straightened out and decides to live a good long life. I do not want to be friends or any of that, but do wish the person and their significant other all the luck in the world. They’ve got a looong hard row to hoe.