celtic_writer

Remarkable Things

A trip into nature taught me I could love something new.

I was six years of age, on a carefully-planned, permission-slip-OK'd excursion to a local farm.

Once off the bus, we were taken to a barn where there was a big iron circle that held lots of yellow things that moved.

Chicks.

The place where they huddled was golden. A tall man, wearing jeans, picked up a chick and taught me how to hold it gently in my hand, its belly supported by my small palm, tiny legs extended through the cracks between my fingers.

The chick looked up at me, chirped and chatted. I looked closely at its small face, its round, black eyes, studied how my breath softly rustled the yellow down on its head.

I knew then that this was a remarkable thing. I understood I could love something foreign to my current realm of knowing. That I could embrace a creature, or place, outside my family.

I sat there holding the chick while the others petted goats and stared at cows, climbed on hay bales, and laughed at the mud of pigs.

I simply listened and watched the tiny bird, cupping it like a gift. I imagined raising both hands to the sky, like the priest did at Mass, holding the chick up towards forever.

When it was time to go, a teacher was summoned to help convince me to release the chick, to let the man in jeans put it back where it belonged, with its kind, with the others.

I cried into the warmth of my teacher's coat as she patiently held me, waiting for the end of my upset before mixing me with the other kids for the trip back to school.

I stared out the window of the bus on the road back, leaned my face against the hard, soon-to-be-winter-cold window. I had held something unique in my young hands, a lesson that was warm, yet raw.

It was the first time I realized that life was about discovery, and also, became aware of its dichotomy. That if I wanted to get at life, I couldn't let any of it hold me back.

So, as time continues on, there are still remarkable things.

* My friend Phyll paints beautiful portraits of people. We have known each other over thirty years, and I never knew she loved to paint. Last year I stood in The Getty Center in Los Angeles and looked for a very long time at a painting called Portrait of Jeanne Kefer by Belgian artist Fernand Khnopff. It reminded me of a lovely, simple painting Phyll created of her granddaughter Claire.

* My mother had a beautifully-shaped head. I did not discover this until she was diagnosed with brain cancer, and lost her hair due to radiation treatments. My mother became a child again in the last days of her life, eating small green grapes from a white bowl held for her, turning her beautiful head to look at the remainder of her world with the utmost wonder.

* My old Labbie Margaret slipped and fell into a quick-rushing river in the western mountains of Virginia. Doug, without a thought, without considering that Margaret was old and past her time, that he had just spent $300 on a new pair of hiking boots, simply jumped in the water, and dove, and dove again until he found the old black dog who was struggling for air in the dark, swirling water, and hauled her safely to shore.

* In Burgdorf, Idaho, I heard an elk cry out, to "trumpet" some message into the cold, clear night. I thought it was a train, the sound so powerful. We were camped on top of a mountain that evening, with a glorious view of the curved sky, a spiral arm of the Milky Way, with stars so big and bright and numerous. Seeing our breath as we sat in the center of the globe of the world.

from the book Driving Mystic by Mary Gillen
Excerpt of chapter "Remarkable Things"
Publication Date: June 2011
© 2011 Mary Gillen

Images:
The Proud Mother Hen and Chicks 1852, by John Frederick Herring. Found at 1st-art-gallery.com

Portrait of Jeanne Kefer, 1885. Fernand Khnopff, Belgian, 1858-1921. The Getty Center, Los Angeles, CA

Varmint Report

The Dow was down 504 points today.

But mice are up!

As one travels along in a 25 ft. RV across the U.S., one may pick up one of nature's hitchhikers.

Mice are great climbers, aerialists extraordinaire. Plug an electrical cord into an outside outlet at an RV park, and it's Rodent Cirque de Soleil. They scamble up the onramp to Cheerios and fresh vegetables and paper and whatever else is available.

I discovered one of these when I was sitting at the kitchen table, writing at a late hour one evening last week. There is a set of aluminum venetian blinds on the window by the kitchen table. Was writing away when two of the blind blades separated, and the face of a brown Stuart Little emerged, as if to say, "OK, Mugsie, who is in charge here?"

OK, I love animals, but no mice are allowed here, as they poop worse than a goose, and chew through wires and spaghetti and, heaven forbid, everything else.

"Shoo," I said.

It disappeared, only to return around 2 a.m. when, sleepily, I heard it chewing on one of the fresh ears of corn we had purchased at a local farmers market. CORN ON THE COB! Don't these varmints know about ethanol? I'm surprised I did not hear a typewriter's end of line DING when the mousie got to the end of a corn row.

Seems to me, centuries ago in the wayback machine, I had a family of relatives who were having trouble with an infestation of mice.

The philosophy of recourse was absolutely fascinating. Please do the following to re-create the experience:

1) Sit talking to the host of the house. In the middle of the conversation, one hears the sound of scurrying behind the walls of the room where one sits. Definitely mice behind the walls. Witness the host abruptly stand up, run to the desk in the room, grab an air horn one would use to express an esprit de corps at a football game, rush to hold it against the wall, and press the button to create an extremely loud noise.

Host says: "Now the mice are scared."
You reply: "No, now the mice are deaf."

2) Decide to use sticky paper traps to catch the mice in the house. When you come home from work, find 5-6 mice still alive, struggling to release themselves from the sticky paper trap. Feel sorry for the mice. Pick up the sticky paper and the mice and put them in a paper bag. Place them on the street. Run them, and the sticky paper, over with the car.

Not wanting to be so loud or dramatic, we went to Home Depot to review the series of traps available to coax the varmints to another world...in this one, or not.

Doug held up a mousetrap, one with the image of a mouse on it, one with Xs in its eyes. I think it was called MouseBeGone. "This will do the trick," he said. He is a kind man, but very pragmatic.

Nope.

I held up a safe trap, one that will catch the buggers so you can let them go, in a land far, far away.

Sold.

Deviously, I set the trap with freshly cut corn from the cob, and a smear of peanut butter. At around 2 a.m., I heard the little steel door slam shut, and knew from the sound of frantic scratching that we had a winner.

Next a.m., I made coffee, and fed Walt, then gathered the trap and took it out to the woods. I opened the trap's door, and the brown mouse, and a little grey one, took off for Costa Rica.

Two for the price of one.

I hope the weather is warm.

Marg, the Marine and a Barbie Wading Pool

Ms. Marg.

You were a short-nosed Lab, one with deep-barrelled chest, spun to life on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, from a mother named Stella and a father called Gus.

You were the runt of the litter. You lived to be 13.

You hated thunderstorms. When one would arrive in Mason Neck, you would go to the bedroom closet, pull most of my clothes off the hangers to make a nest, and bury yourself in the smell of Mary, until the danger passed.

Today, there was no part of Mary that could comfort you. Despite medication, you were in pain. You visited the vet today...and went to sleep. I held you in my arms, as was always done when you needed it, and you sighed as your spirit flew away. And as I held you, your gub came to rest on the top of my foot as you went to sleep. Just like it did when you would lay under my desk while I was working, or playing scales on the guitar in the living room. You liked music.

You were smart, my dear Marg. Sweet. A happy dog. Your tail wagged, even in your sleep. I would be working in the office, and hear you slide off the couch in the living room, to walk down the hall to check on me. I would lay the side of my face on your soft black head and rub your stomach, and you would smile with your soft pink tongue.

A memory: Ken wanted water for you, so he, a big strong ex-Marine, went to the nearest Toys 'R Us and bought you a kiddie pool, one with a picture of Barbie on it, one that could be filled with water, which it was, in the corner of the yard. He was not embarrassed. At the counter he told the cashier, "This is for Margaret. She likes to swim."

And you loved it. A black pup, running across the yard, leaping into the pool's shallow depth. You would bite at the even more shallow depiction of the bottle-blond Barbie painted on the pool floor. You loved puddles and biting at water and burrowing your head against the leg of someone you loved.

So tomorrow morning Walt and I will walk to the Potomac. I will drop a Milkbone in the water. And the ripples of treat will spread in circles, a goodness to be shared with Shaman and Casey, baby Henry, and Barb, the lady who will gently scold you while fixing you something good to eat.

To the Top of Things

It is fall finally. The squirrel is gone from the house, and the droves of blackbirds have flown through Mason Neck, signaling the spawn of cold.

What is the old saying? You simply put one foot in front of the other.

Off to New England tomorrow, climbing trails to the tops of mountains, a journey that smells of pine.

Doug drove his truck and trailer to my home in northern VA, and said, "Hey, let's go. We can develop and hike and listen to whatever happens along the way." And he will visit a surgeon in Bahstin, to have a growth removed from his ear, a remnant of his experience in Vietnam. Agent Orange. It is cancer, but not melanoma. He will survive. It is a time when I will wait for him. Read a book...perhaps Henry Miller or Herman Melville...in a cold waiting room at a VA hospital in Bean Town, where my nurse friend K has an "in", where he will get the best treatment for a bad experience from the top surgeon.

Marg coughs now. Yet she can still climb to the tops of mountains, smiling the entire way. She just wants to be with the pack. Until she can't take another step. She is the sweetest of Labs. And Walt becomes Rin Tin-Tin, galloping through streams.

Leaves change color. So does life. And all move on.

It is the Celtic New Year in a day or so. I like the newness. The Celts believed in life, and that all comes around again.

Something worth believing.

Slacker Squirrel

In 1903 Beatrix Potter wrote a story about a squirrel named Nutkin. The story starts: "This is a Tale about a tail—a tail that belonged to a little red squirrel, and his name was Nutkin."

And one of his clan is now living somewhere in my home.

Aunt Pittypat Hamilton had a great statement in the movie Gone With the Wind about Yankees in Georgia. She declared, Southern-belle hand placed melodramatically upon her forehead: "However did they get in?" It works for squirrels too. How did he get in? Perhaps through the front door, left open when I was out on the drive, gathering grocery bags from the Bug to restock the pantry. Or maybe he came down through the chimney. Perhaps Santa showed him the way.

The Black Labbies are very concerned about this intruder. I walked through the living room the other day to find the little varmint sitting right next to Marg's head as she lay snoozing on the couch. I was surprised he didn't have his little squirrelly feet up on the coffee table, using the cable remote to catch the latest doings on Animal Planet. Just my luck. A slacker squirrel. Get a job!

This isn't the first time Mason Neck's wild creatures have paid a visit to this humble abode. A few springs ago I was cleaning up the kitchen, and had some sundries to add to the infamous junk drawer. As I put the stuff in, I noticed a snake, and closed the drawer.

SNAKE!

It was a small black snake, slithering among the coupons and rubber bands, matchboxes and emergency candles. I slowly pulled the drawer out of the cabinet and, grimacing the whole time, straight arms holding the drawer as far away from me as possible, walked down the back wooden stairs to place the container on the ground so the little snake could twirl its way out of the drawer to go eat some bugs or something else FAR AWAY.

This squirrel is a juvenile (delinquent...probably tries my clothes on when I am not home) and is quick, not willing to be caught. Have been researching tips on how to catch him so I can release him out where he belongs. I have read that squirrels don't like mothballs. My mother tried that with a skunk in the garage, and the skunk slept through the whole undignified ordeal. So it looks like it has to be a safe trap cage with some peanuts in it. Or maybe the lure is a year's subscription to Ranger Rick. I wonder if they have gift certificates.

PHOTO: Squirrel Nutley, illustration from the book by Beatrix Potter, from Gutenberg.org

A Skate, A Fish, and Mr. G.

The state of North Carolina issued me a fishing license.

Seems you can spend 10 bucks and take your chances for ten days to try your luck at creating a great fish story.

Doug got a license to fish too, and we went halfsies on a long fishing pole, two hooks and a weight, purchased from a swarmy fellah at the local Ocracoke Island tackle shop. When asked what one should use for bait when fishing from the shore in ocean environs, the fish store chap said, "Squid." He reached into a nearby cooler and pulled out a frozen box that contained creatures that looked like the appetizer we had at dinner the night before: calamari.

So off we went, over the dunes and down to the shore, carrying our fold-up chairs, chilled bait and fishing pole, ready for action. As we positioned ourselves at the water's edge, I noticed a man in a yellow baseball cap fishing at a place not far away. You could tell he knew what he was doing. He stood stoicly in the water, casting his line way out into the waves, and patiently waiting.

The ocean is rough around Ocracoke Island. Doug strode down into the water and cast the line out. A few minutes later a wave came along and knocked him so hard that he almost lost his bathing costume. He recovered enough to maintain position while keeping his composure, but eventually the line came in empty.

Fish: 1. Us: 0.

My turn. With new squid on the line, I walked into the water, and with my softball-throwing arm, cast the line out as far as I could. Then a rogue wave hit me and I sat down hard on my butt, like babies do when they are learning how to walk. The fellow fishing nearby must've thought the Village Idiots Convention was meeting in town, and had given its members the afternoon off to fish.

Doug got the first bite. It was a skate, those beautiful flat black fish, round as an apple pie pan, with a thin whip tail. It had beautiful eyes. It blinked. It was nabbed, and looked scared. Doug unhooked it, and with the help of a piece of wood found of the beach, coaxed it back in the water. It skimmed happily back into the deep. I swear that fish smiled.

After a few more casts, I felt two sharp tugs on the line, and knew I had hooked something big. Hoping it wasn't an old boot, or a toilet seat that had been hanging around Davey Jones' Locker since WWII, the catch was the smallest, feistiest fish I had ever seen, clinging greedily to the calimari, which was bigger than it. This fish was white, and had a yellow head, and did not want to let go of the bait. Finally it was coaxed to release its treasure, and was soon back in the water, swimming with the skate, both probably slapping their fish knees in glee, laughing at us.

Have always thought fishing to be great fun, but have to say I am used to fishing in fresh, quiet waters. When I was a child, my father would take my brothers and I to numerous "fishing derby" events, usually hosted by the Boy Scouts, an organization that accepted my brothers as members. 'Cept I was the one who caught all the fish. I think that is because the fish knew I always throw them back.

When I was 16, I went with a high school friend, Zena, and her family, to a place called Six-Mile Lake, north of Toronto. You could only get there by boat. It was so remote you had to make noises when you walked to the outhouse in the middle of the night to scare the rattlers away. Zena's father (known as "Mr. G", 'cause "Grot-Zakzrewski" was a bit long on the tongue for most people) and I were great pals, and we would go fishing. He was originally from Poland, had been from a wealthy family in the old country, lost it all in the war, made it through the concentration camps, came here with nothing, dug potatoes in Maine to exist, even though he was a skilled metallurgist. He and his wife made their way in the U.S., did well, adopted my friend Zena and built a good life.

He and I were like Mutt and Jeff...my 5'10" to his 5' 2". "A-Mare-ica," he'd call. "Come. We go fish." Off we'd wander at 6 a.m., to sit on a smooth, rocked shoreline, catching bass after bass (throwing them all back) as we talked about life and Poland and America and school and his '57 Roadmaster Buick and music and Johnny Cash. He loved Johnny Cash. Eventually we'd sit side-by-side, our feet in the cold, cold water and just be quiet.

Campground

It takes almost eight hours via highway and ferry to reach the campground at Ocracoke Island, part of the Cape Hatteras National Seashore. Run by the National Park Service, it costs a pittance a day to rent a camping spot. This sum also gives one access to wooden rest rooms, potable aqua, stunning beach, the ever-present sound of water, and a parade of human characters served up fresh every day.

The campground is its own society. If you want electricity, bring it with you, but don't run that generator after 10 p.m. There is no shade here. Bring your own shadows. The beach has been voted one of the best in the U.S. and I am happy to tell you that you will not find miniature golf here. There is not even a washateria on the island. You have to get on the ferry with your dirty laundry and head north to Kitty Hawk to commercially clean your clothes. Ocracoke wants to keep the crowds away by not changing itself very much. A local artist, David Freed, writes about the island, "...one still senses that the area has been loaned to its residents and that anytime, nature can foreclose."

Doug pulled his trailer here, to camping spot B3, right along the dunes, so near the water. After living on the beach in Mexico for so many years, he knows the right of ways, the memories such a life can bring. I drive to the place in a rented van, and Walt yelps and fusses to be let out when he sees Doug's truck. Walt thinks Doug is the kind of person one should hang around. Marg presses her big soft head against Doug's leg when she greets him.

Just before sunrise, I walk Marg and Walt along the beach, and then the campground road. Walt is on Greenhead Patrol, trying to snap the flies that bite at him. There is a family camping at the other end of the compound that has seven Jack Russell Terriers in tow. They are all walked together morning and evening, and are a leashed, yappy mess of sound.

In the spot next to ours, there is a retired gent from New Jersey named Ed who is proud to tell you -- first thing -- that he has fathered 14 children, and raised them all on his electrician's salary. ("And my wife never had to work," he said.) Ed has brought along a Labradoodle named Doogie who swims with great strides in the ocean, and an African Grey Parrot that can imitate over 300 sounds, including the sound R2-D2 makes in the movie Star Wars. One of Ed's sons is an opera singer. Through cedar trees that separate one camp site from the next, one can hear a beautiful male voice singing scales, and a certain parrot whistling a perfect imitation of a phone ringing.

There's a woman in the spot across the way who is camping alone, and limping around on a broken foot. She chain smokes. There is a priesthood of young guys from New Jersey who hang around outside the restrooms, hoping to strike up conversations with young tattooed Dead Head women who camp in different spots along this circle of ground. One youthful lady dresses in black in the 95 degree heat, long hair and skirts flowing. She proclaims herself a witch. The Jersey Boys stay clear.

And around the corner, one sees a woman in the soft morning light, drinking a bottle of Bud at a picnic table just before 6:45 a.m., her husband visible through the screen door of their camper, brushing his shoulder-length hair, using long languid strokes.

PHOTO: Ocracoke Island Campground, Ocracoke NC. Filtered with Photoshop.

Phyll's Creed

Temp is due to climb to 70 degrees here today in the woods of northern Virginia. Ken died six years ago this morning, and Martin Luther King's birth is celebrated today. Marg and Walt are gnawing on rawhide bones out in the yard under overcast skies. And I am happy to report that so many still want to believe in so much.

I received many emails and comments about the last post called Creed. The response has reminded me that, despite war and tension and the difficulties life throws at us, we humans still find the small specs of contentment and wisdom that contribute to a satisfying life. My friend of almost 30 years, Phyllis Sheerin Ross, known as Phyll, sent me her creed. And here it is:

• The truest saying is: 'If you always do, what you always did, you always get what you always got.'
• Everyone has a BIG secret.
• If you're stuck, only you can get yourself unstuck. Conversely, you cannot unstick anyone else.
• Most people will smile back, when you smile at them. Especially babies.
• Nobody laughs harder at old family stories, than old families.
• The most boring thing that old people can do is to talk about their illnesses. On the other hand, old people make a good audience, as they know it will be their turn next, to talk about their illnesses.
• There's a big difference between silence, solitude, and loneliness. Silence can be punitive, solitude is chosen, and loneliness is not.
• The best remedy for a blue mood is to reread a favorite book.
• The music of Bach can soothe, like no other music. That's all I could listen to for months after 9/11.
• The 1960s were the best time to try recreational drugs, grow your hair long, get drunk, and drop out. If you're still lost in the 1960s, get over it.
• It's even better to sing in your car, than it is to sing in the shower. But, never sing Karaoke.
• People become more attractive, as we get to know them.
• Everyone wishes that Woody Allen would make funny movies again.
• There's no such thing as a good toupee.
• Every day really is an opportunity to start all over, or, at least to try.

if

Sunday is usually a day of rest. Today's menu includes laundry and programming. It is humid. A long walk around the quiet neighborhood early causes Labbies to pant, their pink tongues to show.

Today I write if statements.

In programming, the word if (always coded in lower case) presents a condition, a test. The simple if produces two absolute results: a true/positive/equal action or a false/negative/unequal action. Each outcome is controlled in a pair of curly braces:

if (what's the test? place the question here){
if the answer is true or equal or positive, write what will happen in this space
}
else {
if the answer is false or not equal or negative, write what will happen in this space
}

Computer code either works or it doesn't. There are no grey areas. It produces a black or white result. After the file is saved to the hard drive, I wonder about our lives, and how colorful the grey of it really is.

Last evening, thanks to broadband, I signed on to watch some of the interviews included in the new series Bill Moyers on Faith & Reason. A mixture of authors and mythmakers and faithful and agnostic gathered in New York, invited there by author Salman Rushdie, "the man who spent ten years of his life underground, hiding from Islamic assassins." The question posed: "In a world where religion is poison to some and salvation to others, how can we live together?"

Rushdie: "What kind of a god is it that's upset by a cartoon in Danish?"

Mary Gordon: "As long as you give up the idea that it will answer the questions, I think answering the questions will take place at that moment of rest, which will be in a dimension beyond our corporeal one."

Colin McGinn: "Tolerating somebody else's beliefs is not failing to criticize them. It's not persecuting them for having those beliefs. That is absolutely important. You should not persecute people for their beliefs. It doesn't mean you can't criticize their beliefs."

Sir John Houghton: "One of the most important statements you can make as a scientist is: I don't know. One of the most important statements you can make as a believer is: I don't know."

Some of the most interesting insights delivered in the series so far are by British novelist and mythologist Jeanette Winterson:

About religion:

"...if God says, that He, She is made us in His image, then we are the ones who are full of contradictions. So, that might suggest, that God also, is full of contradictions."

About life's mystery:

"...there are vast dimensions of which I know nothing. But sometimes I can apprehend them a little bit. So I think that in religious terms that sometimes I think of it as the kick of joy in the universe. It's the moment when you feel that the whole thing is bigger than you, better than you, and you connect with an energy which is gigantic. And, I think writers and artists do feel that. I hope that people who are not writers and artists feel that. And it is a moment which is absolutely true, and it absolutely cannot be proved by science. But you feel it."

About idols:

"...when a myth gets fixed, it becomes an idol. That's what idolatry really is. It's when you fix something, and you won't let it evolve, or change, or grow anymore. You get stuck with the thing, and you say, 'No, this is the truth, and only this is the truth. And this will always be the truth.' And so people evolve, society evolves, and there's your idol, slap-bang in the middle, which is the thing that is now completely out of date. You know, but when Jesus was talking about putting new wine in old wine skins; you can't do it. The thing has to keep alive. And one of the ways we keep it alive, is by retelling it. "

As I sit here writing on this Sunday afternoon, I am again reminded that there doesn't have to be an if or an else, except within some computer code. Most of the world has nothing to do with me, for I seek no control over anything or anyone. I have no idea what is possible, as the impossible has no clamp. There is a certain comfort in that, and I would miss that thought if it wasn't around.

Toothache and a Teenaged Bird

So I motored away from class yesterday afternoon, straight into the clutches of Dr. F. and the teeth-gritting sounds of his dental equipment.

I won't bore you with the gruesome details. When I left his office, I was sure that, later on, I was gonna feel like this:

I did what any maimed-in-the-mouth Celt would do under such circumstances. I went to the Shoppers Food Warehouse. I purchased $48.17 worth of supplies, just in case I should expire later in the evening. Heaven forbid my lifeless body should be found in a house with an empty pantry. Also stopped at the Lorton Shell to gas up the Mighty Bug with $38.54 worth of petrol. Saints save us that my expired remains should be found in a house where the small blue car in the drive had been starved, its gas gauge pointing to E.

Oh. I also chased a teenaged bird around the basement.

The condition of the homefront seemed pretty standard when I opened the front door and schlepped the groceries and a leather sack full of hernia-enducing tech books up the six stairs to the main hall. The Labbies circled around, wigglin' and wagglin' and grinning with their pink tongue smiles. "Good woman, we are happy to see you, but we have been sleeping all day like lazy lumps in the cool air, and now we are hungry, and, after a Purina repast, will require a gallop to the river so we can eat minnows."

OK.

I changed my clothes and fed them each a cup 'o dog chow. Soon the front gate was opened, and they romped out to the street towards the Potomac. They galloped and sniffed and peed and pranced like circus horses. I trudged behind. It was 96 degrees, and the novocaine was wearing off.

After our return, Walt was soon asleep on the floor at the top of the stairs of this split-level. The lad was fat, full and foolish, dreaming about chasing bunnies and duckies. I stepped over him to retrieve the mail I had left on the kitchen table, and on the way back to my office, I saw it.

A bird. Sitting between two slats of the bannister, about five inches away from Walt's dozing nose.

Not a chick, yet it wasn't fully grown, as it still had dorky-looking fuzz on its head and wings. "What are you doing there, little bird?" I asked it, like it was gonna tell me. My guess was perhaps it flew in the front door when I was schlepping in the groceries, a wrong turn while trying new wings. Or maybe it just walked in, hopped up the stairs, and didn't know where else to go. Its round eyes were large. And very scared.

Walt, brilliant watchdog, continued to slumber as I stepped over him again to get a closer look at the fledgling. It let me pet its head, and stroke its left wing.

Then Walt, still in sleep, sneezed.

The blast from the Labbie schnoz blew the little bird backwards, and it opened its wings and drifted down the space between the split-level stairs to the hard cold floor of the basement. Freak flag flying, it started squawking.

And running. Fast. Like it had sneakers on.

All around the basement. It encountered a hairball on the floor that was about the size of my head. This caused an abrupt change in direction so it could bump into a leg of a beach chair. Turning west, it squeezed itself through an open space between the spokes of the front wheel of my bike, then jumped into a nearby open box and sat in an old pot.

What to do?

Well, I knew it could fly, a little, and it could definitely run, so maybe the fat cats in the neighborhood wouldn't be able to keep up. It didn't belong in the basement, so I carefully picked up the box and gently took it out to the side yard through the cellar door.

I put the box down on the ground near the big oak tree by the driveway, and scooped Chicken Little out of the pot and placed it in the grass. It took one look at me, as if to say, "Sayounara, suckah" and ran up the side of the oak tree. Like you or I walking up a wall, wearing suction-cup shoes.

Pass the Advil, please.

Alfalfa Photo: http://www.andychristie.com/graphics/toothache.jpg