Kitty City

There are two feral kittens curled up asleep in my office. Which is astounding, if you consider where I come from. Granted, I grew up in a home where animals most definitely out-numbered humans, where several species co-habitated and intermingled, where the Circle of Life was witnessed in all its glory and all its gore on a daily basis. But I wanted nothing to do with it. Ever.

I hated pet hair and pet shit and pet slobber. I hated chewed up toys and books and clothes. Hated the smalls and the noise and that you could never just pick up and go. And that they all demanded (required?) so damned much attention. Attention that I'm pretty sure I thought should be turned toward me.

I swore up and down I would NOT have animals when I was on my own. Ask anyone in my family. They will describe the vehemence with which I proclaimed this.

Instead, I had a kid. And I guess that must have triggered the maternal, nurturing instinct that has opened me up to animals.

You can argue all you want that pets are not like children - and in some aspects, I'd probably agree with you - but the place they inhabit in your soul, and the emotional, physical, mental ingredients it takes to be a mother to a human and to an animal are basically the same, I think.

I've wound up with a dog who's deep and loving soul I swear I can see, but who has made me lose almost as much sleep as my brilliant but difficult child - because she, too, is brilliant and difficult. My work with her and my stubborn determination has prompted people to comment about 'how good I am with animals." This makes me laugh. It makes my mother laugh harder. (Too hard, if you ask me.)

But, I've taught her nothing, really. I'm pretty sure she's taught me a great deal of what I know about staying the course, about commitment, about powerlessness - and about power - about faith and confidence and love. And because she's taught me these things, I'm a better mother to my human child.

Anyway, two kittens. Kittens who would not come anywhere near us when we brought them home - spitting, hissing, growling. They now let us pet them (while hissing), sniff at us, and are almost crawling into our laps.

So far, so good. It remains to be seen how they will do with the other four animals in the house.

Yes. Four. So much for having nothing to do with animals.


Pip and Big Al (I know, I know... but Big Al started out as Blackie - apparently my brilliant child is not so brilliant when it comes to original pet names.)

Tattoo

Don't know if it's the weather, the fact that I have nothing that I HAVE to do today, that A. is stabilized on his meds for the moment or what, but today I have that giddy, carefree, joyous thing going on.

This may sound a little strange, but I think it has something to do, too, with tank top season. When my 'quetza in a conch shell' tattoo shows, I feel empowered. Not sure if it's the significance of my sister's design, or I just have this idea that it makes me look like a rebel bad ass. In any case, it usually adds to the feeling-comfortable-in-my-own-skin package.

After a rough week of recovering from A.'s episode, of too many deadlines at work with too many people out, of trying to figure out if a certain school is the best one for A., and then how to pay for it, today I feel light. Hopeful.

I know better than to think that this will last too long. And that's ok. If I have learned anything in past several years, it's that I have today. Nothing more and nothing less. And I will take short-lived bursts of serenity and joy over none at all.

This week, I have chosen faith over fear as much as I could. It sounds cheesy and naive, but there is no other explanation for the inner peace.

I used to think this was weak. Turning all of this over to some sort of higher power. I have always believed I could manage all my life problems on my own. I've learned that it takes tremendous courage and strength to let go. To keep walking, to take the leap, to admit that I do not know everything.

And, that, I think, is where my tattoo comes in. I am not alone. I am not in charge of the outcome. But I gain strength and tap into a power of sorts when I turn it all over to the Wind. To Quetza. Seeing my tattoo, it being exposed reminds me of that.

Jekyll and Hyde

My chest is constricted, my throat is closed, I am so past crying, it's a little alarming.

A. threw a rake at me today in anger and frustration. It hit me in the back. Left a cut. Blood on my shirt. It has been a while since he has thrown anything. I wish in these moments that I were a big, burly man. That I could grab him by the scruff of the neck and get in his face and scare the shit out of him.

I feel, instead, like a weak-willed woman, too frightened to stand up to her abuser.

But what do you do when this abuser is your child? Bigger than you, and not yet a man? When it is your heart, out of your body, staring at you, fuming? When you know that his bi-polar disorder and lack of treatment for the past 7 years is partly to blame? When the urge to hold him and get him through it is stronger than the urge to fight back, to call the police, to do the things you probably should?

I get stuck in the guilt trap. In the place where I beat myself up with the "shouldas." I should have insisted he stay on medication after the first diagnosis when he was 6. I should have handled these behaviors different from the very beginning. I should have...

But the fact is this: My boy is troubled. Troubling and in trouble. And some days I feel scared and hopeless. On these days, it's hard to remember the brilliant, quirky, eccentric, interesting individual he is. On these days, fear consumes me, and I see him in jail, or alone, or dead, or addicted to drugs and alcohol.

On these days, I feel completely alone. These things are impossible to explain. How does the afternoon start with A. asking to rake leaves for money, to throwing the rake at me, to threatening suicide, to sleep?

He will wake up emotionally hung-over, but pretty much done. And I am left with whiplash and desperate calls to counselors and doctors.

I am grateful that we hit the crisis we did a month ago so that we can finally get some help. But I am angry and frustrated that it took that. What if it's too late?

I guess, though, that it is like anything else. Left foot, right foot, repeat. Left foot, right foot, repeat.

Revisiting writing

I was going to say that I can't believe it's been a year since I've written anything, but that would be an outright lie.

Here's the thing: since I quit drinking a little over 7 years ago (and then smoking three years ago), it's been close to impossible to write. There are a number of things, actually, that I find hard to do without either of those tools, but the absence of writing is one I come back to time and again. It's one of the things that kept me sane.

I considered taking a creative writing class. (I consider doing a lot of things I have neither time nor money to do.) Someone suggested I just start writing. So here I am.

There is not a lack of material, to be sure. Being the single (gay, recovering alcoholic) mother of an almost 15 year old son provides much fodder. I just can't seem to open the well to put it all down.

But I'm going to try.