1. When I was doing laundry this morning, I had to transfer a basket overflowing with dirty clothes into an empty basket. I dumped the pile and heard a thud of plastic against plastic. Our broken salad spinner was sitting on top of the heap. I still can't comprehend how that could have possibly happened.
2. My cat seems to have lost any shred of energy she may have had for Margoshes Boot Camp, probably because we cut back her food and she's dying of starvation. She will no longer chase (or even bat at) her string. It's okay, though, because my mom has devised an ingenious solution: I'll stand at the top of the stairs with Taffy's food bowl containing half of her dinner. My mom will stand at the bottom of the stairs holding a bowl with the other half of Taffy's food. I'll shake her bowl and she'll charge up the stairs. Once at the top, I'll hide the bowl and my mom will shake hers. Theoretically, we can get the cat to scale the stairs several times before catching on to our shenanigans. This plan will likely be put to the test tomorrow. Stay tuned for updates.
3. I looked up the guitar tabs to "Left Behind," a song from the musical Spring Awakening. It's not rocket science, but it's definitely not meant to be played by someone who has not added to her repertoire of 3.7 songs in over a year. After days of an aurally excruciating attempt at chord-picking, I can officially report that giving me access to a guitar is the musical equivalent of handing a two-year-old a set of crayons, plopping her down in front of a white wall, and leaving the room.
4. Starting tomorrow, I will be bird-sitting for my neighbors down the street while they're on vacation. I've taken care of their two cockatiels a handful of times before. While I usually spend the entire ten-minute walk to their house mentally reviewing the proper protocol for capturing the birds should they stage a coup, or trying to remember where the bandaids are stowed in case one or both of the birds decides to spear my fingers with their beaks, I'm generally calm by the time I arrive, ready to lay fresh newspaper in the bottom of their cages, fill their food trays, change their water, and be on my way. I went over last week to pick up the key, and my neighbor refreshed my memory about the bird routine. "You remember Eddie and Molly," she said, sweeping her arm in a wide gesture toward their cages. I swear to you, when those birds and I met eyes, there was only one thing they wanted: my blood. "Eddie's been particularly territorial lately," my neighbor explained. "He might try to nip you when you change the newspaper." I looked at Eddie. Eddie looked at me. I took a slow breath so deep I though my lungs would burst. Eddie puffed up his feathers and squawked. My neighbor opened the cage door (and I stepped backward) and reached in for the water bottle. "It's actually gotten really bad," she said. "He's biting all the time. Sometimes I wait until the middle of the night to feed him." My heart stopped. I mumbled something about needing to get home and all but bolted out the door. As I trudged back to my house, fingering the key in my pocket, I couldn't help but make a mental list of everyone I needed to call with words of love and friendship. I couldn't help but see the murky, water-filled potholes as glistening lakes, the thunderclouds as silver pulled cotton candy. I couldn't help but wipe away a raindrop on my cheek with iron-heavy grief, as if it were the last raindrop I would ever have the pleasure of wiping away.
No comments:
Post a Comment