habits

the essence of our lives

The harbour got considerably sadder this morning when we saw the beautiful red sailboat, moored outside our balcony for fully three months, sail toward the Compromise Street Bridge for the 1030 opening. I so enjoyed seeing that boat every day, though I knew it would depart inevitably because of winter. As my husband noted we were living on borrowed time as the water taxis are gone for the season, dozens of boats are moving south for the winter, and that’s just how life regularly unfolds in early November.

This is rather a habitual thing.

This week is the time change as we lose an hour of light to the mornings. As most people know, I am congenitally incapable of sleeping past 0500 for fear I might miss something interesting. I suppose I ought be appreciative of the sunrise an hour earlier as of Sunday morning. The sadness of summer’s end coincides with the shorter days and the inevitable shortness of light marking this time of year. But, I also like the habit of some light after supper.

Then again, it’s merely a habit.

Hey, Cynthia, could be worse: you could be in Nome or Barrow or northern Norway where my good friend Larry served with the Marines decades ago. Those places already confront few hours of light, much less warmth, by this point in the year. The locals each have their annual lifestyle changes as the earth recharges itself through another winter. I can only imagine assuring a stock of polartec and gussied up ski equipment figure prominently. But, it’s the habit they have carried for many seasons.

Habit permeate our lives even though we don’t explore them much.

Today we carried out a long-standing one: taking our two cats to the veterinary clinic for their rabies injections. We know it will happen in November but we don’t appreciate how vital a move until consider how important these cats are in the satisfaction and joy of our lives.

Eleanor Roosevelt, our beautiful tortie who is likely approaching 18, was rescued in West Virginia according to the shelter where my husband chose her sixteen years ago. He was in the early stages of research for a book on Franklin Roosevelt and the admirals prominent during the president’s four terms. The Navy reclassified the papers he needed, preventing the book’s completion but we do have Eleanor’s name as a momento of that project.

She was still incredibly energetic, wholly dedicated to him, incapable of resisting the urge to knock over anything sitting upright on a horizontal surface (yes, we cleaned up many a spill after she found an offending glass), and a beautiful cat who gradually included me in her universe.

Harry Truman entered our home from the same shelter but he has always required more effort. I was adamant we find an orange tomcat after my lap cat passed away but only two orange guys were at the shelter when we began our quest. Fuego, as his card referred to him, did not ring my husband’s, son’s, or daughter’s chimes. He had been returned to the shelter. He sat aloofly at the upper part of the cage rather disinterestedly. He made no effort to engage us as Eleanor had done years earlier when we first laid eyes on her. I, however, was on a mission so I kept returning to the long, lean orange guy.

Somehow I convinced the family we needed rescue this particular cat. Our discussion rapidly shifted to a name. We had rather anticipated using Franklin, for obvious reasons, but this dude was not a Franklin. He was a starkly attractive, lean, lonnnnggggggg cat but not a Franklin. Between the shelter and home, we ran through a bunch of names yet everyone found Harry minimally acceptable. Since we agreed on that, the Truman surname was pretty simple (we are a bunch of historians in this family)

Then all hell broke loose 36 hours later when we tried merging Harry’s and Eleanor’s lives. She was a strong willed cat—remains such—but he was a stalker. ER had matured over the eight years we had her but she had no intention of sharing her life with a cat jumping on her, trying to pin her down, following her every move, and simply being there. Not in her universe.

Eleanor showed a defensive side we never knew she had. Oh, my. It was horrible. The blood curdling screams at any and all hours of the day when he would approach her in pretty aggressive ways continued for weeks. He would jump on her to play but she was having none of it. We tried separating them to ‘reintroduce’ again but to no avail. We tried cat aromatherapy; we smelled nothing nor apparently did they. My husband drew the line when someone at the vet’s office recommended we call a cat psychologist out by Dulles airport.

After three months of howling, screeching, handfuls of fur all over the place, we finally decided to throw ourselves on the mercy of my husband’s stepsister and her husband (she will learn this from reading today’s column). They had a dog but had had cats, such as Turbo, so they weren’t violently opposed to cats as were so many colleagues at the office. More importantly, they lived on a property where one of the cats could lead a great life in the neato barn, the absolutely gorgeous house, and a life that did not include another cat. We decided to ask if they could take one of the cats. We were utterly desperate.

It was as if Eleanor and Harry understood the conversation or as if they had been playing a horrible game of ‘annoy the new owners’ because the truly unbearable behaviour stopped immediately. Seriously. The day after we decided to see if one of them could go away, they began living together with far fewer problems of any sort (come on, they remain cats so we do have some outbursts as do all children). We have been our happy wee household for almost eight years.

Harry gets himself into trouble when he attacks my husband because he’s been away but we have even figured how to deal with that habit of late. Habits again.

ER is definitely in her dotage but she is still the majestic Eleanor Roosevelt. She hates the vet. It isn’t even the shots but she hates the whole of the place and concept. We heard about how much she hates the vet this afternoon, although I would suggest her volume was only 120 rather than 123 on the ‘ER foul cat language’ scale. It takes a crew of folks to draw blood or give her an injection. I just roll my eyes whenever the vet opines we need a urine sample. Uh, no, absolutely no.

But she no longer knocks things over. She is a marvelous lap cat, especially my lap, which delights me. We hear her squeaky wee voice only when she is frustrated we haven’t given her wet food at her determined hour. She isn’t aware she gets the wet food because she has thyroid issues which were causing her to awaken us at 0300 and beginning again twelve hours later. But, she is hanging in as an 18 year old, living out her life in luxury of two people who wait on her and an adopted ‘brother’ who annoys her far, far less these days. Her habits are sleep, eat, sleep, be petted, sleep, and eat. Repeat as needed.

He is no longer the sleek, lonnnnggg cat who can put his paws on the dining room table as he stands to beg for food. He is still quite able to beg but he is up to 14.5 pounds so he doesn’t move quite as energetically. He has this indiscreet posture where he sleeps with his rear legs splayed open but we obviously never taught him good manners.

Harry decided upon arrival that my husband was ‘the one’. I agreed with Harry about my husband being Numero Uno but notice I saved his sorry little orange tail while he largely saw me as cat box cleaner. Harry warbled for years whenever my husband was out of his sight. He would scratch, cry, and remind us at every turn he needed—NEEDED—be with my husband. It was actually pretty amusing, especially coupled with being a scared cat when others came to visit for any reason.

Annapolis has been good for Harry, however. He is no longer terrified of visitors. He no longer fears my husband alone loves him. He does not jump or startle at each and every sound. Within the last couple of weeks, as the temperatures dropped, he actually started sleeping on the bed. That sounds like no big deal but this cat would not even get on a bed, much less sleep on it until the last 30 days.

He also has welcomed me into his life. Now he cries outside the bathroom door if I am inside. When I arise in the dark wee hours, he makes a beeline to the bathroom to await me, usually rather vocally. Some days he expects water from the faucet while others he just wants to rub up next to me until he is sure I know he is there (rather tough to miss, Harry). After my ablutions, he greets me at the door to the balcony where he darts out for a few minutes, depending on the temperature. His habit is to inspect his domain. He often repeats his outside time with my husband later in the morning..

Both these cats are living pretty good lives, replete with their habits. We also are lucky to share these rituals with them daily and annually.

We forget how deeply we make their lives into our habits and them doing the same with our lives.

We have so many habits throughout our lives. They may be healthy while others may be quite destructive. But they are the essence of who we are. I am simply glad we have these two cats to share life with. They do make life much more amusing than we probably deserve.

Get yourself a cat or dog. Like is so much better when you share.

Thank you for reading Actions Create Consequences. Whimsy is good for us. Laughter and wry humour are tonics for the soul. We need a lot of tonic right now.

Be well and be safe.FIN