Finding Stillness (But Not Kittens)

I’ve spent the past few days setting up stakeouts to stalk a cat.

There is a mama cat in my new neighborhood that recently had kittens. My sources say they were born on or around June 1st. No one has seen the kittens yet, but mama cat (who will be properly named once I get to know her better) is obviously nursing a litter, and she comes out of her hiding place to eat the cat food that people are leaving out for her before disappearing again to wherever she has her nest.

Why am I stalking her? For several reasons.

Reason #1: Kittens!!!

Duh. I want to see her baby kittens and snuggle them and play with them and convince my hubby to let me have one or two of them. * I’m hoping there’s an orange one because 80% of orange cats are male, and I want a boy. (It’s a fact, you can look it up.) Plus, 90% of orange cats are trouble, and I love the troublemakers. (This statistic is not so much “factual” as estimated based on personal experience. For data points, see: Rusty, Tiger, Murcott, Phoebes, and Zeus.)

“RUSTY” – Wanted for licking the peanut butter out of the container and trying to eat the family’s pet rabbit

Reason #2: I agree with Bob Barker.

This is mama cat’s second litter, and she needs to be done. She’s young and deserves to enjoy her life without being tied down. And there are too many stray cats around here already. So, my plan is to find her, feed her, befriend her, locate her kittens, and when they’re old enough to be weaned, take mama to be fixed. The babies too, of course.

Reason #3: I think mama cat wants to be found.

She’s not feral. She allows humans to get close and lingers curiously nearby after eating. With a little patience, it won’t take long for her to trust people. I’m pretty sure, when her babies are old enough, she will want to bring them somewhere safe. I want to be that safe house.

So far, my stalking has been mostly unsuccessful. The problem is that the block where I live has very few houses but lots of sheds and bamboo thickets and woodpiles where a smart cat could make a nest. I’ve meowed outside a couple of likely locations ** and “here kitty-kitty-ed” near several more and listened for tiny, adorable mews, but no luck. I climbed into my parents’ treehouse and sat for half an hour watching for movement, but no luck. I put a bowl of kibble outside my house in view of my reading corner and read/watched for an hour, but no luck. I’ve realized I just have to be patient (<– not my strongest trait) and wait. The next time I see mama cat, I’m going to dash outside with a can of wet food, sweet-talk her while she eats it, and then follow her to her lair. ***

Despite the fact that I don’t have any kittens to snuggle yet, my stakeouts have not been completely in vain. While I haven’t found a troublesome orange tabby, I have found a stillness I didn’t know I was searching for.

I’m a fidgety person. I cross and uncross my legs when sitting, pace while talking on the phone, pick at my fingernails while reading, and pause movies half a dozen times to use the restroom, get a snack, write down a random thought, or walk outside to see if the moon is full. I used to hang out at a coffee shop once a week with a good friend who we’ll call El (because I’m not sure if she wants her real name in my blog and because I’m really into Stranger Things right now). I was always fascinated by how still El could be. While I shifted in my seat, adjusted my ponytail, stretched my back, took my sweater off and put it back on again five times, El simply sat. I talked with my hands, scratched my elbow, and popped my knuckles. El sat. During the drafting of this blog post, I have rearranged the pillows in my chair, laid on the floor to stretch my back, and taken at least five breaks to look out the door and see if mama cat is strolling by. (She isn’t.) Meanwhile, back in Austin, I’m certain that El is sitting serenely at her computer without so much as a twitch. (Though perhaps she is smiling while reading this.)

My fidgetiness isn’t a usually a problem, so it’s not something I try to change about myself. When I want to practice being still, I go to yoga or take a nap or choose to see a movie in the theater where I can’t pause it because I’ve randomly decided to water my plants. But stillness was necessary this week while stalking mama cat. I needed to stay in one place for a decent period, not make too much noise (except for the occasional meow), and limit my own movements so that I could notice if something around me stirred. When the reward is the possibility of kittens, I can calm my fidgets. Although no kittens appeared, I did find benefits to being still. Sitting in the treehouse, straining to hear the mewing of hungry baby cats, I heard so many more birdcalls and squirrel chirps and insect buzzes than I normally would have. Staying in one place and watching for movement below allowed me to see more clearly what was right in front of me: a cobwebby hole in the tree, ants climbing the bark, the delicate veins of an oak leaf.

My stakeouts have reminded me how important it is to stop and be present in the moment. There’s so much to see, hear, and notice when we take the time to be still and breathe.

Also, somewhere there are kittens, and I intend to find them. Wish me luck.

The last time I had the privilege of snuggling kittens was in March 2020 when a friend of mine was fostering these cuties.

* I have a sneaking suspicion that my husband doesn’t read my blog anymore. Perhaps I’ll find out for sure after this post.

** Yes, I’ve been meowing in my new neighborhood. I’m not ashamed of it. Before you get concerned that the neighbors might think I’m weird, you should know that the neighbors are my parents, and they already know I’m weird. They’re WHY I’m weird.

*** This is probably a good time to remind everyone that I don’t have a job right now.

I Shall Be Telling This with a Sigh

In 1995, I left my home in Richardson, Texas, to go to college at UT in Austin. I studied English there for four years and got my teaching certificate, and when I graduated in 1999, I decided to stay. Austin was a cool town: liberal, young, easy to navigate, and full of green spaces and swimming holes and bats and music. There was a lot to love.

Littlefield Fountain and UT Tower

The longer I stayed, the more I found to love. Over the past twenty-seven years, I made life-long friends, taught more than 1500 seventh graders, married my husband, and found myself. I lived all over Austin—north, central, east, southwest—with roommates and alone and with pets I’ll never forget. I swam in Barton Springs, went to concerts at Stubbs and La Zona Rosa and The Continental Club, took countless strolls through the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center and Violet Crown Trails, and tried every coffee shop I could find. I let Austin become a part of me, and I’d like to think I, in turn, became a part of the city I loved.

Austin has changed a lot over the past couple of decades. Apparently, you only have to be an Austinite a couple of weeks before you get to start complaining about other people moving in and ruining things, but I definitely put in the time to earn my opinions about outsiders. Despite the growth, though, I still love Austin, still think it has a lot to offer, still think there are plenty of people keeping things weird.

That’s why it was so hard to leave.

At the start of June, I packed up my house and life and moved back to Richardson with the hubby and pets.

There were many reasons for the move. Mostly, I wanted to be closer to my family, a feeling I’ve had for a while but which was deepened by the pandemic. I was also ready to walk away from teaching again. (Permanently this time? Maybe. Probably. But all that is for a different post.) So, it seemed natural to combine one big move with another.

Part of the decision can probably be chalked up to a mini mid-life crisis on my part. After the past two years, I found myself wanting CHANGE. Covid shrunk our worlds. When the pandemic forced us inside our homes, I obediently folded myself up into a tiny package, got comfy, and stayed there. My isolation was safe and cozy, and I was grateful that the tiny world that became my cocoon was such a happy one. But when society opened up again, I found myself wanting more than just out of my house. I wanted something new.

Not too new, obviously, since I chose to move back to my hometown. Living in Richardson as a woman in my forties isn’t the same as living here as a kid. The town’s changed, and I’ve changed, but our roots are still the same.

We’ve been here two weeks now, and I already miss the people and places I loved in Austin. But there’s a lot to love here, too. New scenery, new walking trails, new coffee shops, and new opportunities to jump back into some dusty writing projects. Plus, a lot of familiar faces I love seeing every day.

What does this mean for future blog posts? Not much. I’m still writing from my same little desk, just with a new view out the window. And I still have my same writing companions, just with new spots to fall asleep to the sound of my typing. I’m looking forward to my new life here, and looking forward to sharing it with you.

Note: This piece is being posted from my favorite new coffee shop, Staycation, because after two weeks of living here, we still don’t have internet. We’ve had two cables buried in our yard, two installers who came to the house, two installers who didn’t come to the house, and we’ve racked up roughly eight hours of phone time/ hold time/ trying-to-keep-our-blood-pressure-down time with Spectrum*, but we still can’t watch Stranger Things. (So don’t you dare talk to us about it!) Based on the empathy we’ve received from family and friends over this, I know we’re not alone. I’m thinking of forming a support group for people whose lives have been negatively affected by Spectrum, but we’d have to meet in person because… no internet.

* Before you suggest we go with someone else, we have very few options where we are, and I refuse to start over with someone new after going through all this. But, if you have a choice, I recommend you don’t choose Spectrum.

The Future of Education Works for Belly Rubs

Dogs are amazing. This is not debatable. Their eyebrow expressions alone earn them a spot in the Best Things About the World Hall of Fame. But dogs are not just adorable pets with droopy jowls and waggy tails and happy paws that tippy-toe when their humans come home from work. They’re intelligent, loyal animals who have been trained to do some very important jobs. More than once, I’ve met a dog whose responsibilities humbled me. Like the black lab who worked at the same elementary school as I did. My job was to shelve library books. Hers was to detect a little girl’s seizures before they happened and alert an adult.

Dogs guide the visually impaired, rescue people buried in avalanches, sniff out illegal substances, provide therapy for children, and calm veterans suffering from PTSD. They. Are. AMAZING. Therefore, I propose one more career option for canines: substitute teaching.

Hear me out.

Schools are currently facing a teacher shortage and a sub shortage. When a teacher is absent and no substitute can be found, other staff members have to give up their conference times to cover classes, or students must be sent to the library or gym to be monitored in large groups, resulting in a more stressful, less effective learning environment.

The best way to solve this problem is to pay teachers a salary that matches the demands of their job, and treat them with the respect they deserve, so that people want to apply to work in education. The second-best way to solve this problem is to compensate teachers for their unused personal days when they resign or retire, so they’ll be less likely to take a bunch of days off at the end of their career.

But, since no one seems to want to do any of those things, I suggest hiring dogs as subs.

Picture this: Your unruly, end-of-the-day advisory class is getting squirrely. Students are kicking the desk of the person next to them for no reason, leaving their assigned seats to roam around the classroom with evil intent, and shouting at people walking past in the hallway. Now imagine that their sub is a 120-pound German shepherd sitting ramrod straight and perfectly still at the front of the room. Every time a student stands up, turns around in their seat, or speaks above a whisper, the dog lets out a deep guttural growl that makes every hair on every middle schooler in the room stand on end.

That’s effective classroom management if you ask me.

I. SAID. SIT. DOWN.

In elementary schools, subs aren’t just required within the classroom. They’re also needed to escort students between spaces. This is an excellent job for border collies. No child will be lost on the way to lunch or wander off during P.E. with a border collie as a substitute. Disobedient kids might come home with a sore ankle or two, but the pack WILL STAY TOGETHER.

Even mature, well-behaved classes can benefit from dog substitutes. Are your choir students nervous about their upcoming competition? Hire a husky that sings along and makes them laugh. Got a stressed out senior AP class cramming for exams? Send in a corgi to offer a soft belly for them to scratch while they study.

My face when students ask, “Is this for a grade?”

From pugs to poodles and beagles to basset hounds, every dog has a special gift to share. So, teachers, the next time you test positive for covid or need a mental health day and can’t find a sub, see if your neighbor’s labradoodle is busy.

What could go wrong?