For weeks after we arrived in Lexington, I frequently mistook the locals for people I knew back home. I saw Pam O’Brien, a science teacher I worked with in Modesto, pushing a cart outside the Kroger’s market in Versailles. I looked up at a promotional poster for perfume in Macy’s and recognized Angie Bohn, a friend from Ripon. I would see a face in a church choir or a man walking his dog and suppress the urge to walk up to the familiar face and start talking. I compared my unheard-of side effect to the phantom sensations experienced by an amputee. My brain, overloaded by masses of new information, was attempting to process more efficiently by recognizing similarities, trying to make familiar patterns out of the unfamiliar.
After about six weeks in Lexington, the flashes of false recognition went away, and I was instead overwhelmed with how different everything seemed. I was meeting new people and trying to build a new life. I don’t suppose I make friends easily, and the overwhelming hours that went to a new job and a new house didn’t make it easy to form new relationships. Even now I realize that after a six month investment in my new life my new connections aren’t fully formed. Instead, my consciousness is crowded by loads of information I’ll probably never need again: how to get a Kentucky driver’s license, what number to call for utilities, and what exactly goes in those blue recycling cans that are picked up every week. I console myself: these things take time; I can’t expect twenty years of connections to be reformed overnight.
Last Thursday our old life intruded on our new one when Craig and I boarded a plane in Lexington at 7:30 p.m. and stepped off another one at 11:30p.m. in Sacramento. The journey to California will always seem shorter than the journey back home because of the backwards jump across three time zones. A few afternoon naps and I was fully acclimated to pacific standard time again, which left me wondering if twenty-two years of living in one time zone fixed my internal clock like magnetic north, leaving me stuck “three hours off” for the rest of my life in Kentucky.
I don’t envy the job of the FAA luggage search team, who evidently spent hours going through our four bags. They must see everything in their line of work, but imagine having to unpack and inspect an entire suitcase of individually bubble wrapped bottles of Ale 8-1, a Kentucky ginger ale beverage my Mom developed a taste for when she visited in November. Our other gifts-only suitcase was jammed with sundry Christmas gifts, including a James Archambeault’s Kentucky calendar, a box of Bourbon cherries, and a brick. Craig wanted to present his mom with a brick taken from the run down family home in North Dakota, which we visited this summer shortly after arriving in Lexington. We cushioned it with layers of paper and fabric so it wouldn’t pulverize the Mint Blue Mondays, traditional local candies we bought to hand out to the relatives. The soft candy was unharmed, but we opened our suitcase in Modesto to find the brick wrapped in plastic coating and sealed with official tape marked THIS ITEM INSPECTED AND CLEARED BY THE NATIONAL SECURITY ADMINISTRATION. Not wanting to put asunder what the feds had so painstakingly joined together, I wrapped the brick as it came with the other presents. Craig’s mom will, I am sure, be touched that one of her gifts received such special attention.
Looking over aspects of the place I spent most of my life, I notice the strangest things. I am strangely disconcerted by the wall texture at my parents’ house, and keep glancing out the corner of my eye at the river-bottom-pebbly surfaces that are a staple in California. Our old house in Ripon had even more texture, whorls and peaks like meringue cookies, and I can’t imagine how strange it would seem to me now. Coupled with the acoustic “popcorn ceilings” and the overall lack of windows typical of the 70’s-style energy efficient track home, we didn’t have a true corner or a really flat surface in the whole house. The walls of our new house are as smooth as fondant cake, a flat, pleasing surface but not very forgiving. Every nail hole, paint drip, and sticky cat hair becomes archived on our walls. Even though I am still not used to it, my home in Kentucky has reset my standard of what is normal.
My overwhelming first impression of California after six months away was “it’s still here.” The home prices are still plummeting, making us glad that we were able to sell our house last summer. Ten dollars at the pump still won’t buy enough gas to make it to Turlock and back. The neighbors overwater their winter lawns until the excess overflows over the sidewalk and runs down the gutters. When the wasted water reaches the storm drains, they are still so small and constantly plugged that an eighth of an inch of rain floods the streets with puddles large enough to stomp around in. The Costco still hands out food samples, and I still never get any because large families still swoop in and grab all the samples off the tray just as I am quietly and patiently reaching for one. Everything is just like I remember it, right down to the new housing development going in a street over from my parents’ house (unrestrained growth being the norm).
Not all that I remember is bad, though. I spent a pleasant two hours catching up with coworkers from my old school and left thinking how my new job hasn’t yet made me feel a tenth so accepted and connected. I celebrated my nephew's birthday at McDonalds, and rejoiced to find the paper seat guards that all California stores have in their public restrooms. I hadn't seen the words "provided for your protection" since we crossed the Rocky Mountains. I am taking daily walks in the above-freezing evenings, admiring the additions that the neighbors have made to their light arrangements this year. My brother Tim and I sat across from his laptop searching for funny recordings on YouTube. We hit our old favorites videos (like the Burger King employee singing “ding, fries are done” to the tune of Carol of the Bells) and found some new ones: Chad Vader: Day Shift Manager, and the house whose Christmas lights blink on and off to the music of the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. Last night we spent our traditional half-hour in the hot tub before bed, prompting my dad to tell the story of how I once accidentally locked them out of the house on Christmas morning, leaving them to broil in the spa for an extra fifteen minutes while I obliviously took a shower.
Craig and I knew when we moved that we were signing up for years of vacations to be taken “back home” instead of seeing new places. Looking on orbitz.com for plane rates in September, packing suitcases just as Craig is submitting his final projects and I am tabulating semester grades, and sleeping off jet-lag on Christmas Eve are all aspects of the path we have chosen. I will be forever comparing here to there, like when I look down at my bowl of peppermint stick ice cream and wish that it had sticky candy pieces in it like the Kentucky brand does. I’ve had a few months for old and new to rearrange themselves to fit into this new version of myself, and I suppose there are more new connections to make.
Monday, December 24, 2007
Sunday, December 16, 2007
Pass the Shovel?
With only three days left until we board the plane to spend Christmas in California, it happened just in time. We awoke this morning to see a powdered-sugar dusting of snow covering our front yard. We ate breakfast and drank coffee, watching the two neighbor cats make tracks in the thickening blanket covering our back deck. I walked out to get the mail and watched white flakes swirl around me. It didn’t amount to much, but it was better than nothing.
I must admit I was becoming increasingly piqued by the lack of “real weather.” Craig spent last week in San Diego, attending a conference in forty-degree weather, while I sat on the couch with the windows open and let a pleasant, seventy-five degree breeze air our house. I drove to work in the mornings through a low fog that burned off around nine a.m. and endured gray days of constant showers. If I didn’t look outside to see the brick houses, I wouldn’t know I’d ever left California.
I was born in South Dakota, so snow was a part of my very early childhood. My mom fondly tells a story of bundling baby me into the back seat of the car, a blanket over my carrier so I wouldn't catch cold. When the blanket was removed upon arrival by someone I didn't know, I screamed shrilly at the stranger invading my cozy privacy. I remember playing outside in the snow, and my mom bringing tubs of snow inside in severe weather so my brother and I could stand on a chair at the sink and make castles and log cabins out of the cold droplets. I am sure that school closures and snow days were in my past even though I don't remember them. We moved to Modesto when I was six years old. With us came our huge, flat-bottomed snow shovel, and if it had only been kept for twenty-two more years I am sure it would have been presented to Craig and me before we moved. As it was, it lingered unused in the garage for five years before being given away.
“Well, if you don’t like the weather in Kentucky, just wait a day and it’ll be different,” says one of my coworkers. The long- time residents, the hardened veterans of some really scary winters, tell me I should be glad that this winter has been mild so far. They tell me stories, half-shuddering and half-boasting over the winters they’ve seen. Most stories I hear are about the dreaded ice storm of 2002.
“It basically closed down the whole town for eight days,” says a co-worker. “We had no power, and no means of getting power because the ice had snapped the power cables to most people's houses. Before the city could restore electricity, they had to check street by street to make sure everyone had fixed their cables.”
“I came down with the flu on the first day of the storm,” says another. “All I could do was lie in bed with seventeen blankets on top of me and watch the tree outside my window. A branch the size of a pencil would have three inches of ice around it. The branches broke, making a sound like the house was falling down. Many older, familiar trees had to be cut down after the storm.”
“The city sold out of kerosene heaters, bacon, and eggs on the first day. A friend who just moved to Lexington from Los Angeles kept calling me because she was afraid of being alone in her freezing apartment. One night she said it was forty degrees inside and she wanted to know if she would die if she fell asleep,” pipes in another, overhearing us.
“Okay, I know I don’t want THAT much weather, just enough to make me feel like I’m really a Lexingtonian,” I reply.
My first Kentucky snow two weeks ago didn’t exactly have the air of romance I’d been expecting. I looked outside my window at work one Tuesday morning at 11 a.m. to count twelve flakes, none of which I caught on my tongue because I was indoors. Rushing out the door to twirl in circles on the concrete walk probably would’ve been frowned upon, even though everyone knows that I am from California and should therefore be expected to do strange things.
This morning Craig and I took turns standing outside in the falling snow, snapping pictures to take with us for our families in California. I had expected to come home for Christmas armed with “weather stories” to tell our friends. I checked the level of antifreeze in our car to make sure we were prepared for plummeting temperatures. We made sure all of our outside faucets had safety features to keep them from freezing. Our winter clothes are organized in bins in the front closet, but instead I can still get by on the morning drive without a coat. After mentally preparing for Kentucky weather, I feel a bit cheated, but at least I haven't had to buy a snow shovel.
I must admit I was becoming increasingly piqued by the lack of “real weather.” Craig spent last week in San Diego, attending a conference in forty-degree weather, while I sat on the couch with the windows open and let a pleasant, seventy-five degree breeze air our house. I drove to work in the mornings through a low fog that burned off around nine a.m. and endured gray days of constant showers. If I didn’t look outside to see the brick houses, I wouldn’t know I’d ever left California.
I was born in South Dakota, so snow was a part of my very early childhood. My mom fondly tells a story of bundling baby me into the back seat of the car, a blanket over my carrier so I wouldn't catch cold. When the blanket was removed upon arrival by someone I didn't know, I screamed shrilly at the stranger invading my cozy privacy. I remember playing outside in the snow, and my mom bringing tubs of snow inside in severe weather so my brother and I could stand on a chair at the sink and make castles and log cabins out of the cold droplets. I am sure that school closures and snow days were in my past even though I don't remember them. We moved to Modesto when I was six years old. With us came our huge, flat-bottomed snow shovel, and if it had only been kept for twenty-two more years I am sure it would have been presented to Craig and me before we moved. As it was, it lingered unused in the garage for five years before being given away.
“Well, if you don’t like the weather in Kentucky, just wait a day and it’ll be different,” says one of my coworkers. The long- time residents, the hardened veterans of some really scary winters, tell me I should be glad that this winter has been mild so far. They tell me stories, half-shuddering and half-boasting over the winters they’ve seen. Most stories I hear are about the dreaded ice storm of 2002.
“It basically closed down the whole town for eight days,” says a co-worker. “We had no power, and no means of getting power because the ice had snapped the power cables to most people's houses. Before the city could restore electricity, they had to check street by street to make sure everyone had fixed their cables.”
“I came down with the flu on the first day of the storm,” says another. “All I could do was lie in bed with seventeen blankets on top of me and watch the tree outside my window. A branch the size of a pencil would have three inches of ice around it. The branches broke, making a sound like the house was falling down. Many older, familiar trees had to be cut down after the storm.”
“The city sold out of kerosene heaters, bacon, and eggs on the first day. A friend who just moved to Lexington from Los Angeles kept calling me because she was afraid of being alone in her freezing apartment. One night she said it was forty degrees inside and she wanted to know if she would die if she fell asleep,” pipes in another, overhearing us.
“Okay, I know I don’t want THAT much weather, just enough to make me feel like I’m really a Lexingtonian,” I reply.
My first Kentucky snow two weeks ago didn’t exactly have the air of romance I’d been expecting. I looked outside my window at work one Tuesday morning at 11 a.m. to count twelve flakes, none of which I caught on my tongue because I was indoors. Rushing out the door to twirl in circles on the concrete walk probably would’ve been frowned upon, even though everyone knows that I am from California and should therefore be expected to do strange things.
This morning Craig and I took turns standing outside in the falling snow, snapping pictures to take with us for our families in California. I had expected to come home for Christmas armed with “weather stories” to tell our friends. I checked the level of antifreeze in our car to make sure we were prepared for plummeting temperatures. We made sure all of our outside faucets had safety features to keep them from freezing. Our winter clothes are organized in bins in the front closet, but instead I can still get by on the morning drive without a coat. After mentally preparing for Kentucky weather, I feel a bit cheated, but at least I haven't had to buy a snow shovel.
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
Take Three and Call Me in the Morning
I make fun of people who buy health insurance for their pets. I mean, pets are great, but they’re animals. Nothing supports an impending communist overthrow in America more than the idea that there are two classes of people in our society: one that can’t afford health care, and another that insures themselves and their dogs and cats. Besides, I think Ally would like to remain in the ranks of the uninsured. She hates the vet so much; any insurance that would result in more frequent trips would be odious to her.
I still remember the first time I took her to the vet. She had been mine for a month, and I was looking around for a way to save the $200 new cat checkup fee that the local vet charged. I found a shot clinic that would do a short exam and the complement of tests and shots for a fourth of the cost. One Saturday I borrowed a cardboard carrier from my mother-in-law, and at noon unceremoniously placed Ally in the box and loaded her in the front seat of the Mustang. She disliked the carrier immediately, but I’ll never forget the frenzy that came over her the moment I started the car. As I pulled out of the driveway, she let out a primal yell. The carrier started rocking back and forth, and I caught glimpses of her through the air holes: one round eye, a splayed paw with claws fully extended, a lip curled to reveal her long, predatory incisors. I rolled my eyes. “Sorry, kitty, but this is for your own good. It’s a raw deal, but you need to be healthy,” I crooned in a soothing voice.
Ally was not about to take my word for it. As I drove down Main Street, her upper and lower jaw emerged from two of the air holes and ripped away the cardboard between them. A pointed face poked out and glared at me, and then disappeared. A rigid, sinewy arm snaked out, grabbed the cardboard corner, and there was a great ripping sound as she tore off the top of the carrier. Just as I was about to take the freeway entrance, she leapt indignantly out of the carrier and sank her claws into my lap.
I hold the controversial opinion that animals should be confined during car travel. They enjoy the trip more if they can roam around, but an animal cannot be trusted to act responsibly in a difficult situation. It seems more humane to let them free, but if you slam on the brakes and they dive under the pedal for shelter, both owner and cat are at risk. I don’t think that humane behavior risks the lives of cat and owner. This notion was confirmed by Ally, who immediately started running laps around the seats of the car like a jungle warrior. As her tail whipped past my face for the third time, I pulled away from the freeway entrance, parked at the curb, and tried to subdue my frantic cat.
Try as I might, she would not sit back in the carrier long enough for us to go home. My efforts must have looked like I was beating her senseless, with my arms flailing out and writhing to catch her claws before they raked me to shreds. I was afraid someone would see and report me for animal cruelty. Finally, we compromised; she cowered on my lap, growling as I drove the five blocks home.
When Craig came home an hour later, he didn’t know what to think. Wife and cat were gone, and on the floor splayed a shredded cat carrier, wound around with layers of duct tape. Ally had resisted all efforts to modify the carrier, and so I called my mother-in-law. She drove us to the clinic while I held Ally motionless, a blanket wrapped tightly around her body so that only her outraged head was visible.
Three years later, I contemplated driving 2500 miles in the same fashion as we drove those first few blocks: me distracted, Ally wailing and struggling. It wasn’t a pleasant idea. Craig and I exhausted all forms of inquiry regarding alternate forms of transport for Ally. Flying her to Lexington was out; airlines didn’t transport animals when the hot summer weather could steam them like clams in the compartments. There were no train accommodations or pet transport services that we could locate. We had no choice but to drive her ourselves.
For weeks before our departure I scoured magazines and the internet for tips for safe cat travel. I noted suggestions to buy catnip toys, train the cat to walk on a leash, and put one of the owner’s garments in the carrier to make the cat feel secure. The only thing Craig wanted to know was how many drugs we could pump into the small, furry body so she would make the trip senseless and be revived when we reached our destination. About three days before we left, we began confining Ally so she wouldn’t go on a roam and miss our departure. The first two nights were disconcerting. Ally’s continuous, strident meows told me that she was not happy about being confined. “Not a problem—she’ll get tired after a few minutes and fall asleep,” I told Craig. She didn’t. “Oh, well. She’ll get hoarse and have to stop. It’s too bad, but it is for her own good,” I sermonized. She continued mewling all night, only stopping periodically to change her pitch and frequency. In the morning, I admitted defeat and told Craig that he was right. Ally wasn’t going to make the trip without some form of tranquilizer. Furthermore, Craig and I couldn’t listen to her syncopated wailings for 2500 miles with our ears and good natured personalities intact. I admitted defeat and made a 2 p.m. appointment for her to see the local vet.
After that first unforgettable vet experience three years ago, I had invested in a rubber carrier that provided the dual advantages of keeping Ally in and letting her see out. Once she could perceive large dogs in line at the shot clinic, she usually wised up and behaved perfectly, demurring to strangers while curled up delicately on her paws. I thought spending fifty bucks on a carrier that Ally would use for an hour a year was tantamount to her joining the ranks of the pampered pet. I wasn’t one of those barbaric miscreants who would expect my kitty to be shipped in cardboard like a UPS package. Oh, no. I grabbed Ally’s paws securely and forced her into the carrier. She turned around and glared at me through the front grate. Well, I would’ve stepped in myself if you had only asked me nicely, she sniffed.
Yeah, right.
It takes a special kind of person to be a vet. My cat’s childhood vet was a gangly, comical man who joked around with us while he conducted his examinations. He would tell my brother and me an anecdote about a dog he saw last week while deftly jamming the needle in the other side of Mittens’s body. We noticed the way that Mittens’s eyes would bulge comically every once in a while, but otherwise we weren’t traumatized at the thought of our kitty getting poked with needles. I assumed that all vets were tactful, sympathetic, and affable. I imagined that Ally and I would engender much sympathy as we walked in, me sleepless and casted, dragging Ally’s carrier in a halting circular motion because of my uneven gait.
As soon as our name was called, two large-knuckled hands snatched the carrier. I murmured gratefulness while a strong, husky woman peered in at my kitty and frowned disapprovingly.
“Why don’t we see her regularly?” barked a deep voice accusingly.
“She gets seen elsewhere, usually,” I muttered vaguely. Your rates. She gets the same shots for half the price, without the added indignity of you jamming a thermometer up her…
“Well, then why aren’t you taking her there now?” she raised an eyebrow, palpating Ally’s stomach with her meaty hands.
“Um, they’re not open.”
“And you are driving her WHERE in this thing?” she asked, indicating her carrier.
“Kentucky. I…”
The vet gave a snort of derision. “Those Southern states have a lot of soil parasites. She should be seen IMMEDIATELY upon arrival so the vet can suggest a proper treatment course.”
“Okay,” I replied meekly. I’m not going to the moon with her. Lexington is still in America, you know. I am sure that there are plenty of cats there that haven’t succumbed to the evils of giant parasites. What are you going to tell me next? Don’t give her any mint julep?
“And that,” she snorted at the carrier, “is totally out of the question. How would you like to be confined for fifteen hours a day in a space so small you can’t stand up?” she looked up from wielding the dreaded thermometer to narrow her eyes at me.
“Hmmm…” I mused. You mean like the cabin of a car? At this point, the lack of sleep and the forlorn look on Ally’s face was too much for me. I knew exactly what I was going to put both of us through, and I had to do it. The only alternative was to leave her here, destroying Ally’s faith in humanity and reducing me to the level of her previous owner who abandoned her when a move got too stressful.
The vet, who I could easily imagine tramping down the lines of cattle feed lots administering shots of bovine growth hormone, looked up at me and softened. “I’ll prescribe something to keep her calm. Just fill the prescription, get her a bigger carrier, and the trip should go all right,” she said, handing me a script.
“Xanax. Isn’t that…”
“Yes, it’s an anti-anxiety medication most commonly given to people, but it’s recently been cleared for animal consumption. Give her a pill morning and night and it will give her a much more phlegmatic perspective on this whole thing.” From the look in the vet’s eyes, she thought the cat wasn’t the only one who could use a tranquilizer. I clumped out of the vet’s office, Ally’s mood in no way improved by the encounter.
“One prescription for Ally, please,” I told the local pharmacist. The cat’s name was printed on a pill bottle, along with our last name. “Hah, hah, the cat’s got travel anxiety, poor thing. Needs a little something to help her through,” I said, my voice flippantly cheerful. I certainly didn’t want him to think I was the one taking happy drugs! I went home, crushed a tablet into a spoonful of tuna, and offered it to Ally, who dutifully licked it up.
“We don’t have room for a flat of tuna cans in the car, kitty. Tomorrow, you’re doing it the normal way,” I hinted darkly.
That night, in my parents’ house, I listened to Ally’s shrieks, trying to detect a hint of calmness in her manner. Maybe a few doses really increases the effect, I thought.
The next morning, I held her securely between my knees, used one hand to wedge her jaws open, and dropped the pill into the back of her throat, closing her mouth and massaging her neck like I was told to. That wasn’t so hard, was it, kitty? I remonstrated, although I would be livid if anyone did the same to me. I didn’t swallow pills well until I was fifteen, and my mom plied me sweetly with pills in applesauce, never hogtying me down and forcing a finger down my throat. After I let Ally hop away,I looked down to see a familiar, circular white object stuck to my left knee. I sighed and went to find her. She ran away from me so assiduously that she skittered across my parents’ tile floor and hit the wall. We fastened her, finally properly dosed, into the new, larger carrier I had bought the day before.
I’m not sure that Ally took a breath in the first 206 miles of the trip. She warmed up with scales until we reached the highway, and then ran through her entire repertoire of sounds that convey negative emotions. We were past Fresno before she started taking ten minute breaks, and almost out of California when she finally fell asleep.
“Maybe the medicine is finally working,” I told Craig. Hearing this, she sat up and started another yowl.
Feeling frazzled, we pulled into Flagstaff, Arizona after 10 p.m. and searched for our pet-friendly hotel. In the elevator, a nice old man commented on how tired we all looked.
“The cat’s never been more than ten miles away from home before,” I said, and then told him where home was going to be. He whistled.
Inside the hotel room, Ally was definitely acting like she was under the influence. When I opened the door of her carrier, she levitated straight out of it, turning four somersaults across the bed, leaping to a chair, rolling off and trying to take refuge under the bed. She bounced off the guard and was still, panting like she had just run a marathon. She shook her head as if startled, and then jumped up on Craig’s lap, sliding off his knee and landing confusedly on the floor on the other side of him. She pulled herself onto the bed again, and then immediately started batting the roses on the printed bedspread like they were jumping up to hit her.
I flopped down on the cigarette-burned sheets. “I’m beat!” I announced. “Thank goodness she got all of that aggression out of her system. She should be really quiet tonight! I’ll just put her back in the carrier so she’ll feel more secure.”
Set up in the bathroom with her litter box and food, Ally’s wail increased to a frenzy that I thought the neighbors could surely hear. I passed the first night in terror, waiting for a knock on the door asking us to quiet down. We couldn’t help it; we had no control over our pitiable animal traveling companion.
At three in the morning, I dressed, gathered Ally’s carrier, and woke up Craig. “Ally and I are going for a drive,” I whispered.
“What?” Craig was incredulous.
“We are going out for a drive. Parents often do this to settle their hysterical children, and I am sick of hearing her howl at me. Every time I move a muscle in bed, she gets louder,” I burbled inchoately.
Craig eyed me warily. I was wearing the crumpled jeans that I had taken off the night before, and a tank top that was inside out. “You are not leaving with the cat!” he mandated. “We are in a strange city in a questionable area of town, and you are not driving around with the cat in the middle of the night singing Rock-a-bye Baby! Just stick her back in the bathroom and go to sleep.” He ordered. I sniffed and placed her carrier back in the bathroom, draping a towel over the top like it was a parrot’s cage. Amazingly, she stopped. I went to sleep fully dressed, my arm around my husband.
“Do you think I could just take the anxiety meds tomorrow and let Ally do without?” I wondered aloud.
I still remember the first time I took her to the vet. She had been mine for a month, and I was looking around for a way to save the $200 new cat checkup fee that the local vet charged. I found a shot clinic that would do a short exam and the complement of tests and shots for a fourth of the cost. One Saturday I borrowed a cardboard carrier from my mother-in-law, and at noon unceremoniously placed Ally in the box and loaded her in the front seat of the Mustang. She disliked the carrier immediately, but I’ll never forget the frenzy that came over her the moment I started the car. As I pulled out of the driveway, she let out a primal yell. The carrier started rocking back and forth, and I caught glimpses of her through the air holes: one round eye, a splayed paw with claws fully extended, a lip curled to reveal her long, predatory incisors. I rolled my eyes. “Sorry, kitty, but this is for your own good. It’s a raw deal, but you need to be healthy,” I crooned in a soothing voice.
Ally was not about to take my word for it. As I drove down Main Street, her upper and lower jaw emerged from two of the air holes and ripped away the cardboard between them. A pointed face poked out and glared at me, and then disappeared. A rigid, sinewy arm snaked out, grabbed the cardboard corner, and there was a great ripping sound as she tore off the top of the carrier. Just as I was about to take the freeway entrance, she leapt indignantly out of the carrier and sank her claws into my lap.
I hold the controversial opinion that animals should be confined during car travel. They enjoy the trip more if they can roam around, but an animal cannot be trusted to act responsibly in a difficult situation. It seems more humane to let them free, but if you slam on the brakes and they dive under the pedal for shelter, both owner and cat are at risk. I don’t think that humane behavior risks the lives of cat and owner. This notion was confirmed by Ally, who immediately started running laps around the seats of the car like a jungle warrior. As her tail whipped past my face for the third time, I pulled away from the freeway entrance, parked at the curb, and tried to subdue my frantic cat.
Try as I might, she would not sit back in the carrier long enough for us to go home. My efforts must have looked like I was beating her senseless, with my arms flailing out and writhing to catch her claws before they raked me to shreds. I was afraid someone would see and report me for animal cruelty. Finally, we compromised; she cowered on my lap, growling as I drove the five blocks home.
When Craig came home an hour later, he didn’t know what to think. Wife and cat were gone, and on the floor splayed a shredded cat carrier, wound around with layers of duct tape. Ally had resisted all efforts to modify the carrier, and so I called my mother-in-law. She drove us to the clinic while I held Ally motionless, a blanket wrapped tightly around her body so that only her outraged head was visible.
Three years later, I contemplated driving 2500 miles in the same fashion as we drove those first few blocks: me distracted, Ally wailing and struggling. It wasn’t a pleasant idea. Craig and I exhausted all forms of inquiry regarding alternate forms of transport for Ally. Flying her to Lexington was out; airlines didn’t transport animals when the hot summer weather could steam them like clams in the compartments. There were no train accommodations or pet transport services that we could locate. We had no choice but to drive her ourselves.
For weeks before our departure I scoured magazines and the internet for tips for safe cat travel. I noted suggestions to buy catnip toys, train the cat to walk on a leash, and put one of the owner’s garments in the carrier to make the cat feel secure. The only thing Craig wanted to know was how many drugs we could pump into the small, furry body so she would make the trip senseless and be revived when we reached our destination. About three days before we left, we began confining Ally so she wouldn’t go on a roam and miss our departure. The first two nights were disconcerting. Ally’s continuous, strident meows told me that she was not happy about being confined. “Not a problem—she’ll get tired after a few minutes and fall asleep,” I told Craig. She didn’t. “Oh, well. She’ll get hoarse and have to stop. It’s too bad, but it is for her own good,” I sermonized. She continued mewling all night, only stopping periodically to change her pitch and frequency. In the morning, I admitted defeat and told Craig that he was right. Ally wasn’t going to make the trip without some form of tranquilizer. Furthermore, Craig and I couldn’t listen to her syncopated wailings for 2500 miles with our ears and good natured personalities intact. I admitted defeat and made a 2 p.m. appointment for her to see the local vet.
After that first unforgettable vet experience three years ago, I had invested in a rubber carrier that provided the dual advantages of keeping Ally in and letting her see out. Once she could perceive large dogs in line at the shot clinic, she usually wised up and behaved perfectly, demurring to strangers while curled up delicately on her paws. I thought spending fifty bucks on a carrier that Ally would use for an hour a year was tantamount to her joining the ranks of the pampered pet. I wasn’t one of those barbaric miscreants who would expect my kitty to be shipped in cardboard like a UPS package. Oh, no. I grabbed Ally’s paws securely and forced her into the carrier. She turned around and glared at me through the front grate. Well, I would’ve stepped in myself if you had only asked me nicely, she sniffed.
Yeah, right.
It takes a special kind of person to be a vet. My cat’s childhood vet was a gangly, comical man who joked around with us while he conducted his examinations. He would tell my brother and me an anecdote about a dog he saw last week while deftly jamming the needle in the other side of Mittens’s body. We noticed the way that Mittens’s eyes would bulge comically every once in a while, but otherwise we weren’t traumatized at the thought of our kitty getting poked with needles. I assumed that all vets were tactful, sympathetic, and affable. I imagined that Ally and I would engender much sympathy as we walked in, me sleepless and casted, dragging Ally’s carrier in a halting circular motion because of my uneven gait.
As soon as our name was called, two large-knuckled hands snatched the carrier. I murmured gratefulness while a strong, husky woman peered in at my kitty and frowned disapprovingly.
“Why don’t we see her regularly?” barked a deep voice accusingly.
“She gets seen elsewhere, usually,” I muttered vaguely. Your rates. She gets the same shots for half the price, without the added indignity of you jamming a thermometer up her…
“Well, then why aren’t you taking her there now?” she raised an eyebrow, palpating Ally’s stomach with her meaty hands.
“Um, they’re not open.”
“And you are driving her WHERE in this thing?” she asked, indicating her carrier.
“Kentucky. I…”
The vet gave a snort of derision. “Those Southern states have a lot of soil parasites. She should be seen IMMEDIATELY upon arrival so the vet can suggest a proper treatment course.”
“Okay,” I replied meekly. I’m not going to the moon with her. Lexington is still in America, you know. I am sure that there are plenty of cats there that haven’t succumbed to the evils of giant parasites. What are you going to tell me next? Don’t give her any mint julep?
“And that,” she snorted at the carrier, “is totally out of the question. How would you like to be confined for fifteen hours a day in a space so small you can’t stand up?” she looked up from wielding the dreaded thermometer to narrow her eyes at me.
“Hmmm…” I mused. You mean like the cabin of a car? At this point, the lack of sleep and the forlorn look on Ally’s face was too much for me. I knew exactly what I was going to put both of us through, and I had to do it. The only alternative was to leave her here, destroying Ally’s faith in humanity and reducing me to the level of her previous owner who abandoned her when a move got too stressful.
The vet, who I could easily imagine tramping down the lines of cattle feed lots administering shots of bovine growth hormone, looked up at me and softened. “I’ll prescribe something to keep her calm. Just fill the prescription, get her a bigger carrier, and the trip should go all right,” she said, handing me a script.
“Xanax. Isn’t that…”
“Yes, it’s an anti-anxiety medication most commonly given to people, but it’s recently been cleared for animal consumption. Give her a pill morning and night and it will give her a much more phlegmatic perspective on this whole thing.” From the look in the vet’s eyes, she thought the cat wasn’t the only one who could use a tranquilizer. I clumped out of the vet’s office, Ally’s mood in no way improved by the encounter.
“One prescription for Ally, please,” I told the local pharmacist. The cat’s name was printed on a pill bottle, along with our last name. “Hah, hah, the cat’s got travel anxiety, poor thing. Needs a little something to help her through,” I said, my voice flippantly cheerful. I certainly didn’t want him to think I was the one taking happy drugs! I went home, crushed a tablet into a spoonful of tuna, and offered it to Ally, who dutifully licked it up.
“We don’t have room for a flat of tuna cans in the car, kitty. Tomorrow, you’re doing it the normal way,” I hinted darkly.
That night, in my parents’ house, I listened to Ally’s shrieks, trying to detect a hint of calmness in her manner. Maybe a few doses really increases the effect, I thought.
The next morning, I held her securely between my knees, used one hand to wedge her jaws open, and dropped the pill into the back of her throat, closing her mouth and massaging her neck like I was told to. That wasn’t so hard, was it, kitty? I remonstrated, although I would be livid if anyone did the same to me. I didn’t swallow pills well until I was fifteen, and my mom plied me sweetly with pills in applesauce, never hogtying me down and forcing a finger down my throat. After I let Ally hop away,I looked down to see a familiar, circular white object stuck to my left knee. I sighed and went to find her. She ran away from me so assiduously that she skittered across my parents’ tile floor and hit the wall. We fastened her, finally properly dosed, into the new, larger carrier I had bought the day before.
I’m not sure that Ally took a breath in the first 206 miles of the trip. She warmed up with scales until we reached the highway, and then ran through her entire repertoire of sounds that convey negative emotions. We were past Fresno before she started taking ten minute breaks, and almost out of California when she finally fell asleep.
“Maybe the medicine is finally working,” I told Craig. Hearing this, she sat up and started another yowl.
Feeling frazzled, we pulled into Flagstaff, Arizona after 10 p.m. and searched for our pet-friendly hotel. In the elevator, a nice old man commented on how tired we all looked.
“The cat’s never been more than ten miles away from home before,” I said, and then told him where home was going to be. He whistled.
Inside the hotel room, Ally was definitely acting like she was under the influence. When I opened the door of her carrier, she levitated straight out of it, turning four somersaults across the bed, leaping to a chair, rolling off and trying to take refuge under the bed. She bounced off the guard and was still, panting like she had just run a marathon. She shook her head as if startled, and then jumped up on Craig’s lap, sliding off his knee and landing confusedly on the floor on the other side of him. She pulled herself onto the bed again, and then immediately started batting the roses on the printed bedspread like they were jumping up to hit her.
I flopped down on the cigarette-burned sheets. “I’m beat!” I announced. “Thank goodness she got all of that aggression out of her system. She should be really quiet tonight! I’ll just put her back in the carrier so she’ll feel more secure.”
Set up in the bathroom with her litter box and food, Ally’s wail increased to a frenzy that I thought the neighbors could surely hear. I passed the first night in terror, waiting for a knock on the door asking us to quiet down. We couldn’t help it; we had no control over our pitiable animal traveling companion.
At three in the morning, I dressed, gathered Ally’s carrier, and woke up Craig. “Ally and I are going for a drive,” I whispered.
“What?” Craig was incredulous.
“We are going out for a drive. Parents often do this to settle their hysterical children, and I am sick of hearing her howl at me. Every time I move a muscle in bed, she gets louder,” I burbled inchoately.
Craig eyed me warily. I was wearing the crumpled jeans that I had taken off the night before, and a tank top that was inside out. “You are not leaving with the cat!” he mandated. “We are in a strange city in a questionable area of town, and you are not driving around with the cat in the middle of the night singing Rock-a-bye Baby! Just stick her back in the bathroom and go to sleep.” He ordered. I sniffed and placed her carrier back in the bathroom, draping a towel over the top like it was a parrot’s cage. Amazingly, she stopped. I went to sleep fully dressed, my arm around my husband.
“Do you think I could just take the anxiety meds tomorrow and let Ally do without?” I wondered aloud.
Tuesday, December 4, 2007
Third Time's a Charm?
They’ve found us again.
One week ago I was sitting on the couch contemplating the peacefulness of our recent home life when the phone rang. I answered it to hear a three second pause and a familiar click. As I hung up, I decided that one of the perks of moving is a six- month vacation from telemarketers.
I know that there is an immunity list that I am supposed to join if I don’t want to receive calls, but my skeptical self doubts that it actually works. I accept telemarketing as an inevitable aspect of life, and I honestly think it is better that way. Craig sees it differently, though. He swears that I keep myself available to telemarketers so that I can treat them nastily if I feel like it. Maybe it’s true. If so, I am definitely justified. Dr. Pilkey, my college literature teacher, said that in a state of war, whether public or personal, normal rules of decency and honesty need not apply.
“Christians lied to protect Jews during the Holocaust, even though dishonesty goes against their faith. They were in a state of war with people who were contrary to their ideals, and so they had no obligation to tell the truth. Likewise, if a burglar stands at your door demanding money, you have no obligation to be especially decent or honest to him. If he demands to know if there are people in your household, you need not endanger your family by telling him the truth,” he said. I think that this reasoning should apply with telemarketers. They are at war with my ideals: I want to relax in my peaceful house and be unmolested by outsiders, and they are trying to take that away from me. Especially on days when I am already mad about something, I don’t feel like social standards of politeness and courtesy apply to them. When I lived in California, the purchase of our first house started a steady stream of calls that didn’t abate until we sold it two years later.
“Hello, this is ADT security! How are you on this fine day?”
“First of all, the fifth straight day of rain is not often referred to as ‘fine’. Second, I am irritated because this is the sixth time I’ve been solicited by your firm in the past month. I haven’t changed my mind since the fifth time you called me, and don’t you think that logic would dictate that I won’t at all?” I replied bitingly before hanging up. I admit that I handled the call cuttingly, but did she really have to CALL ME BACK only to call me an unprintable name that invoked my gender but mistook my species?
This is why I can’t stand telemarketers. I think they only act nice because they want something. If they wanted to be really nice, they could just not call me at all. I thought there were no exception to this rule, so imagine my surprise when I received a cold call last week that didn’t immediately turn my stomach. I picked up the phone to hear an older man wishing me a good day in a golden honey Southern accent.
“How are y’all doing on this fine day,” purred a rich voice, evoking images of antebellum mansions where steaming cups of coffee are served on verandas. Something in me softened. I could tell this man didn’t know me and in just a moment would ask me for something, but I couldn’t feel a shred of my usual outrage.
“Well, I’m just fine,” I said brightly. I couldn’t believe it. That peach pie voice would not let me act my mean self. He went on to say that he was from the Lexington Canine Police Partners and was calling to earn support for in-school programs that keep kids from using drugs.
“The kids just love to see the dogs, and we make such a difference to them. Can the kids count on your support, ma’am?” he ended with the rhetoric of a Southern senator.
This was my cue to tell him off. Years of research have proven that these programs are a total waste of government funding. Furthermore, I taught for years in the tender age where those kinds of choices are made, and I know that petting a German shepherd is not going to keep a kid from using drugs if they already intend to. I wish it would, but it’s naïve to think so.
To my astonishment, I didn’t have the heart to turn him down. I’ll give you twenty dollars just to talk some more in that wonderful accent of yours, I thought. Instead, I asked for his website and promised to check it out. It was the first time I had ever let a cold caller go without some form of reproach. Craig listened to this conversation with growing incredulity, knowing how I usually am.
“Well, he was just such a nice old man. It wouldn’t be right to be mean to him. Maybe telemarketers are just nicer here, too,” I reasoned. He stared at me like I had just undergone a severe personality shift, and I guess I had.
People are generally nicer here. In our favorite bookstore, a man walked up to us and asked if we were finding everything we needed. We were a few minutes into a conversation when we realized he wasn’t wearing the polo shirt and nametag of a store clerk. He must have noticed, because he laughed and said “No, I don’t work here, I’m just a really nice guy!” We waited to be helped at the Verizon store and their Fed-Ex delivery man rattled off a list of places we had to see when he learned we were from out of state. Two clerks that caught me looking at the six foot ladders at Lowe’s convinced me that it would fit into my Malibu. They proved it by wiggling it into my car themselves. I find myself engaged in conversation with strangers in almost every line I stand in. I don’t know if it’s weird to tell the grandmotherly figure behind me about my four nephews or hear about her recent surgery, but I like it. Everybody here seems so connected.
The isolated case of rudeness I experienced here is that people tended to cut in front of me in line. The third time this happened, I had to stop and analyze the situations to figure out why I was being so ignored. I realized that I would queue the California way, where courtesy demands at least five feet of private space between me and the person in front of me. Then, so as not to appear nosy or rude, I would stare off into space and fail to make eye contact in a Californian show of well-mannered aloofness. I realized that Lexingtonians thought I was just a strange person dawdling in the middle of the aisle, not a person in line. Now I stride boldly up to a conversational distance and start chatting about UK basketball to the person in front of me. Nobody cuts and my turn comes, but much more slowly than it did in California, mainly because the cashiers chat with you while lovingly packing each grocery item in its very own bag. Yep, I’m definitely not in California anymore, and it’s not just that the storm drains are big enough to swallow my cat.
I really thought I moved into an area of unmitigated politeness, where even phone solicitors treat people with courtesy and respect. This one-sided view was shattered yesterday when I received another phone call.
“Hello, is Craig there?” said a disappointingly not-so-Southern voice.
“Who’s calling?” I purred back. I’m not calling Craig to the phone from upstairs to refuse a cold call and hang up.
“Lexington Canine Police Partners, but we’re calling for Craig, so please put him on,” he clipped.
I let an accustomed trace of ice creep back into my tone. “We don’t donate to organizations that solicit only over the phone,” I stated bluntly. I mean, really. It’s just a waste of time for them at this point.
“Well, it’s too bad that you don’t want to help us out, but Craig supported us last year, lady. Why don’t you just give him the phone?”
“Last year we lived out of state, and neither of us had ever heard of you. I know he didn’t give money to you because we share all accounts. You want our money and you lie to us,” I fired back.
“Fine. I’ll just call back then,” he snapped.
“And find me in the mood for prevaricating telemarketers? I don’t think so,” I snapped back, and then saved him the trouble of hanging up on me.
I don’t know whether to be sad or pleased. On one hand, my paradigm is restored. Not everyone in Kentucky is ready to sit me down and offer me sweet tea. There are jerks here, too. I should have asked him if he recently moved here from California.
One week ago I was sitting on the couch contemplating the peacefulness of our recent home life when the phone rang. I answered it to hear a three second pause and a familiar click. As I hung up, I decided that one of the perks of moving is a six- month vacation from telemarketers.
I know that there is an immunity list that I am supposed to join if I don’t want to receive calls, but my skeptical self doubts that it actually works. I accept telemarketing as an inevitable aspect of life, and I honestly think it is better that way. Craig sees it differently, though. He swears that I keep myself available to telemarketers so that I can treat them nastily if I feel like it. Maybe it’s true. If so, I am definitely justified. Dr. Pilkey, my college literature teacher, said that in a state of war, whether public or personal, normal rules of decency and honesty need not apply.
“Christians lied to protect Jews during the Holocaust, even though dishonesty goes against their faith. They were in a state of war with people who were contrary to their ideals, and so they had no obligation to tell the truth. Likewise, if a burglar stands at your door demanding money, you have no obligation to be especially decent or honest to him. If he demands to know if there are people in your household, you need not endanger your family by telling him the truth,” he said. I think that this reasoning should apply with telemarketers. They are at war with my ideals: I want to relax in my peaceful house and be unmolested by outsiders, and they are trying to take that away from me. Especially on days when I am already mad about something, I don’t feel like social standards of politeness and courtesy apply to them. When I lived in California, the purchase of our first house started a steady stream of calls that didn’t abate until we sold it two years later.
“Hello, this is ADT security! How are you on this fine day?”
“First of all, the fifth straight day of rain is not often referred to as ‘fine’. Second, I am irritated because this is the sixth time I’ve been solicited by your firm in the past month. I haven’t changed my mind since the fifth time you called me, and don’t you think that logic would dictate that I won’t at all?” I replied bitingly before hanging up. I admit that I handled the call cuttingly, but did she really have to CALL ME BACK only to call me an unprintable name that invoked my gender but mistook my species?
This is why I can’t stand telemarketers. I think they only act nice because they want something. If they wanted to be really nice, they could just not call me at all. I thought there were no exception to this rule, so imagine my surprise when I received a cold call last week that didn’t immediately turn my stomach. I picked up the phone to hear an older man wishing me a good day in a golden honey Southern accent.
“How are y’all doing on this fine day,” purred a rich voice, evoking images of antebellum mansions where steaming cups of coffee are served on verandas. Something in me softened. I could tell this man didn’t know me and in just a moment would ask me for something, but I couldn’t feel a shred of my usual outrage.
“Well, I’m just fine,” I said brightly. I couldn’t believe it. That peach pie voice would not let me act my mean self. He went on to say that he was from the Lexington Canine Police Partners and was calling to earn support for in-school programs that keep kids from using drugs.
“The kids just love to see the dogs, and we make such a difference to them. Can the kids count on your support, ma’am?” he ended with the rhetoric of a Southern senator.
This was my cue to tell him off. Years of research have proven that these programs are a total waste of government funding. Furthermore, I taught for years in the tender age where those kinds of choices are made, and I know that petting a German shepherd is not going to keep a kid from using drugs if they already intend to. I wish it would, but it’s naïve to think so.
To my astonishment, I didn’t have the heart to turn him down. I’ll give you twenty dollars just to talk some more in that wonderful accent of yours, I thought. Instead, I asked for his website and promised to check it out. It was the first time I had ever let a cold caller go without some form of reproach. Craig listened to this conversation with growing incredulity, knowing how I usually am.
“Well, he was just such a nice old man. It wouldn’t be right to be mean to him. Maybe telemarketers are just nicer here, too,” I reasoned. He stared at me like I had just undergone a severe personality shift, and I guess I had.
People are generally nicer here. In our favorite bookstore, a man walked up to us and asked if we were finding everything we needed. We were a few minutes into a conversation when we realized he wasn’t wearing the polo shirt and nametag of a store clerk. He must have noticed, because he laughed and said “No, I don’t work here, I’m just a really nice guy!” We waited to be helped at the Verizon store and their Fed-Ex delivery man rattled off a list of places we had to see when he learned we were from out of state. Two clerks that caught me looking at the six foot ladders at Lowe’s convinced me that it would fit into my Malibu. They proved it by wiggling it into my car themselves. I find myself engaged in conversation with strangers in almost every line I stand in. I don’t know if it’s weird to tell the grandmotherly figure behind me about my four nephews or hear about her recent surgery, but I like it. Everybody here seems so connected.
The isolated case of rudeness I experienced here is that people tended to cut in front of me in line. The third time this happened, I had to stop and analyze the situations to figure out why I was being so ignored. I realized that I would queue the California way, where courtesy demands at least five feet of private space between me and the person in front of me. Then, so as not to appear nosy or rude, I would stare off into space and fail to make eye contact in a Californian show of well-mannered aloofness. I realized that Lexingtonians thought I was just a strange person dawdling in the middle of the aisle, not a person in line. Now I stride boldly up to a conversational distance and start chatting about UK basketball to the person in front of me. Nobody cuts and my turn comes, but much more slowly than it did in California, mainly because the cashiers chat with you while lovingly packing each grocery item in its very own bag. Yep, I’m definitely not in California anymore, and it’s not just that the storm drains are big enough to swallow my cat.
I really thought I moved into an area of unmitigated politeness, where even phone solicitors treat people with courtesy and respect. This one-sided view was shattered yesterday when I received another phone call.
“Hello, is Craig there?” said a disappointingly not-so-Southern voice.
“Who’s calling?” I purred back. I’m not calling Craig to the phone from upstairs to refuse a cold call and hang up.
“Lexington Canine Police Partners, but we’re calling for Craig, so please put him on,” he clipped.
I let an accustomed trace of ice creep back into my tone. “We don’t donate to organizations that solicit only over the phone,” I stated bluntly. I mean, really. It’s just a waste of time for them at this point.
“Well, it’s too bad that you don’t want to help us out, but Craig supported us last year, lady. Why don’t you just give him the phone?”
“Last year we lived out of state, and neither of us had ever heard of you. I know he didn’t give money to you because we share all accounts. You want our money and you lie to us,” I fired back.
“Fine. I’ll just call back then,” he snapped.
“And find me in the mood for prevaricating telemarketers? I don’t think so,” I snapped back, and then saved him the trouble of hanging up on me.
I don’t know whether to be sad or pleased. On one hand, my paradigm is restored. Not everyone in Kentucky is ready to sit me down and offer me sweet tea. There are jerks here, too. I should have asked him if he recently moved here from California.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)
