I look at the news feed first thing in the morning.  I guess i could change that.  Not look.  But i look.  Often,  more often than not,  there is a subtle ripple of nausea.  literally.  but then,  it  passes and i drink my tea.  turn my thoughts to the day ahead.    After the tea and after feeding Tay and Tazmeena there is Goat Feed.   And lately,  more and more,  we have an audience.  I hesitate to even put it here,  like putting is claiming and i am not claiming,  but it's how it seems to be going.  its the

WayBack~UnderHouse Feral Family.   Mother,  Wheat,  Liona,  and that last one.  Lately i've taken up calling him Rat Boy in my mind.  I don't know if he is a he or a she.  Maybe i'll never know?  Because of behavior,  i'm even wondering if Liona is a female.  Maybe she is not,  maybe Lion.  These words with spanish accent…Leeowna  or Leeown….

anyway,  to document these days of July,  2017  and how we managed all this time to have nothing living under the house,  but wouldn't you know it,  now we do.

more and more,  the 3 kittens are there.  They play in the debris of the downed Russian Olive.  They even play on the porch steps.  and when i come to distribute the feed to all 5 feed bowls,  they run back some,  but stay,  watching.  Feral,  but also attracted.

i rarely see the mother but when i do,  she is being a very good mother.  She lies out there with them in early morning or afternoon,  sometimes just watching,  sometimes playing with them.  They climb and pounce all over her.  She doesn't mind.  

i  began feeding them intermittently and then more,  because the little ones have sharp little teeth now that you can hear crunching on the dry cat food.  They are growing.  At first i thought not to put any food and they might go away,  but they aren't going anywhere and that changed to maybe if i put dry food they would be inclined to eat fewer lizards.  The kittens practice hunting.  She's teaching them.   So i fill a bowl everyother day.  of course,  water.  the water is in the green pyrex thing i make brownies in.     I didn't want to say this here,  but it's something that needs to be noted.  as in Field Notes.  Some days ago,  i went around that corner to fill the bowl and there was no sign of them.  Usually when they hear me.  they come to at least peek through the slats of the pallets.  No sign of them but Brain said…"what's that shape there?"  and i lowered my gaze to see maybe about 8 inches of a snake.  8 inches beginning at its head,  with an open eye,  along to where it's body stopped.  Judging from the size of its head,  i would guess that it,  when it was a whole snake,  was almost 2 ft long.  The rest of it,  however was not there.  and when i went back on the second day later,  nothing was there but very delicate white bones.  Eaten.

i love,  like love,  thinking about all the snakes that might live here,  invisible to me….so private in their lives that i never see them,  just what i am sure are their holes.  I had seen,  over the years,  the large Bull Snake mother.  Just a few times.  but she was magnificant.  That was back when i had the Guinnea hens.  She lived under the Palace and ate their eggs.  I am sure,  that over in the stick pile there are snakes.  Maybe only one…or two?….and then under the pallets where i get wood delivered.  There too.  I like knowing they are there.

i didn't look closely at this Part of a Snake,  i couldn't.  So i don't know what kind of snake it was.  So i don't know how old it was.  My guess is maybe 3 years.   There was pain in my heart.  Snake.  eaten.  and too,  though,  there was wonder about that small tortise shell mother cat,  small.  That caught and dragged an at least 2 foot snake to feed her children.

What else is there to say?

 

I finished the Pocket for Daydreams Cloth….it's in the shop.  I put it there to keep a record but its probably spoken for.

 

Pocket for day dreams    $45

Daydreams…i day dream about so much now.  Being between Here and There,  it's pretty much just nothing but daydream.

 

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11 responses to “just the truth of how it is”

  1. Mo Crow Avatar

    (((Grace))) I love reading your field notes and your pocket is so full f joy!

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  2. r Avatar
    r

    hi grace .. this Pocket for Daydreams is perfect, so grace beautiful. I miss all the grace beautiful things I used to read from you. I haven’t been around .. I lost touch. I didn’t know how to regain it.. but mostly life became a reactionary stream.
    Would the Snake be honored by you making something with her bones? She is part of you isn’t she? … and they would be lovely in your art.One of my favorite experiences (now a story… so I guess I could say, “One of my favorite life stories) was with the most beautiful little Snake. She was my Welcome Home Warrior Snake. Goddess, She was Gorgeous!! So me? (not that anyone is asking, but …I would love to wear them… maybe in a little glass bubble around my neck. But of course I do believe that it would require asking Her. She’s probably there waiting for someone to ask? Maybe? … She could say no. But She could say yes. What do I know? maybe you already know, because you’ve already talked to her. ..
    Yesterday when you wrote this, I finally got out of my house (for the first time in weeks. When I got to the place I was going, they asked me for a urine specimen. But I couldn’t create it. I tried and tried and tried and tried. But I couldn’t. So I offered to reschedule my monthly appointment at the pain clinic. (I knew they wouldn’t let me have my medication, if I didn’t pee when they asked me to pee.) They don’t tell you when they’re going to ask for one. But she said, “NOwah. (stretched it out over two syllables they way my mother did when she was being nice like that. “nOwah. Don’t worry about it” … It’s odd to me that I couldn’t make pee, but 10 minutes later I cried for 2 hours and 35 minutes .. there must have been bucket of tears that came out of me. (I’ve been holding it in for a very, very, very long time.) I was beyond embarrassed. I could not stop crying. And I couldn’t speak to answer their questions. Finally I could say a few things and when I left, it felt like the whole world was staring at me. (I knew that would happen if I ever started crying.) .. But you’d think with all that water in me that was free to come out in tears, that I could have peed a half inch of pee in a little tiny plastic cup that wasn’t much bigger than a shot glass. haha .. I guess the cells in my body reserved them for a more important mission. I know cells are smart. If there’s anything I’ve learned about the human body, it’s that the cells are geniuses. Pretty soon they’re going to reject the keys at the receptor sites that down load bunk data …. and that, my adored friend, will be the end of many disease s, including cancer. I betcha it happens when we learn how to talk to our cells with specific details. But first, we have to become smart enough to know what to tell them and to love them like our sisters and brothers. .. (well, I don’t have sisters and brothers I guess) So I would love them like border collies and horses.
    r

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  3. Peggy McG Avatar
    Peggy McG

    Cats feral or not – hunters. I love love love my cats and i hate hate when they bring me a dead present. I grieve for the creatures. I grieve for any roadkill that we humans with machines do. And human life wasted, i cant even go there in this tiny space. The pocket with such beautiful colors could hold should hold does hold beauty to get past ugly. Sending love..

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  4. dee Avatar

    at first read, I dashed ahead, thinking the snake had eaten the kittens. and how upsetting that would’ve been. but then to recognize the snake being eaten is the same thing, only the other way, made me see the funny way we take sides with things.

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  5. Carolyn Petersen Avatar
    Carolyn Petersen

    So sorry the cats are wrecking havoc on the critters. I might have been tempted to take the little golden boy. But I adopted a 6 week old feral kitten. It was very difficult, my American Short Hair cat never forgave me. She was right…………he was always a wild animal. Argyle rip.

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  6. grace Avatar

    the pocket was Happiness to stitch
    i wasn’t going to put that here…about Snake, but it’s
    important. There will be many things like that
    on the Hill. Things eat.

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  7. grace Avatar

    this is such a Magnificant “telling”….and i would for sure
    say you have regained “touch”….my Heart smiles with all of
    this.
    and Snakes bones…the next time i went to feed the Family,
    there were like maybe two left, or one and a half and many
    harvester ants gathered in that space. So She was fully
    received by her world…completely. Just her Spirit left
    for me.
    i agree with Knowledge of Cells and how they hold the keys and how
    we need to love them like border collies and horses, how
    we need to learn how to LISTEN….
    Thank you so much for coming here and leaving this message.
    I hope you come back soon, Love….

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  8. grace Avatar

    you know…i felt it as just How It IS. We all eat. Everything
    must eat to live. the mother cat cannot continue to feed
    her children from her own body. And how amazing it was that
    she was so skilled. Tears, yes, for the loss of the
    Beauty Full snake…i love them so much, i really love them
    more than feral cats, but oh, sigh, everything must eat.
    The BIG bull snake that lived and maybe still lives out there
    somewhere could easily eat a kitten. and would. without
    hesitation. and yes. I Grieve for the road killed from
    carelessness.
    there is always beauty to balance the Hard.

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  9. grace Avatar

    it is. and there’s no sides to keeping alive. we all
    want to keep alive.

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  10. grace Avatar

    i wish they had set up housekeeping over in the Albatross. There are
    many mice out there because of the Goat feed.
    “barn cats” are good partners.

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  11. Yvette Avatar

    Love xxxxxxxxxxxx

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