Kitten Induced Terror
This morning the kitten flipped himself through the stairwell rails and dropped several feet onto the hardwood stairs. He then ran into the basement and hid while growling.
I thought I would throw up when I realized what happened.
Brow and I both ran down the stairs. Bertie fell down part of the steps he was rushing. He fell again coming up because he was worried.
I felt this terrible shame that is failed to keep the kitten safe. Certain CK would get angry that I wasn't careful.
Ursa seems fine. CK wasn't mad, she reminded me that he's inadvertently knocked himself off the bed twice.
She got why I felt so bad.
Power went out again too. This led to pizza for dinner.
Still feeling sad and demoralized. My students shared today that most of them are feeling the same.
Today the kitten slept with Dora, which was pretty great.
Not Yet Hopeful
Thank goodness for goofy dogs, tiny kitten, and continued stability for Cancer Kitty.
I'm watching Democratic celebration talk with weariness. I'm not yet feeling hopeful about this country much less celebrating it.
I fought hard to keep from falling into anger again today, but it felt like a huge effort top stay merely blue.
Cancel Thanksgiving
I forgot creamer when I went to the store to order CK's turkey. It felt like a failure.
I thought I'd run to another market, but CK said she'd rather I hold off making that trip until I need things next week for Thanksgiving next week.
Fred Meyer stores, Kroger, have the same careless, "Don't confront non-mask wearing customers" policy that lead me to stop shopping at Natural Grocers. It is so heartless to the employees and customers.
COVID rates hit a new record daily. People still want their fucking Thanksgiving.
I'm so angry I thought about screaming again but I haven't learned how to without losing my voice. I actually cried for a few minutes because I couldn't even think about making art.
After some art studio organization so I can set up the gift from a friend tomorrow, I felt able to make a comic about feeling so sad and angry today. I get 2 of 3 chores I myself done and told the Inner Jerk to, "Fuck Off!", because it isn't the end of the world if there's wrinkles in the laundry.
The kitten rides my shoulders! While folding laundry! He also flops into my hand or up against my body with tiny, happy squeaks, and goes to sleep.
I'm not sure how this will work if he grows into a big kitty, but it's pretty delightful now. Kittens definitely help the moments where I feel the losses of 2020 so keenly.
Days of Exhaustion
Today we have both been tired and our low energy has been making use both blue. It doesn't help that the headlines after full of T* supporters holding a parade and rally rejecting the election, most of them without masks.
COVID is so bad right now and people are intending to have Thanksgiving dinners with 10 or more people attending! Hospitals are once again low on supplies and beds.
I'm feeling so irritable about it all that I want to scream again. I realize that my self-directed anger has been very high today too.
This is why I was up at midnight playing Animal Crossing while the kitten sleeps on me.
The tiny kitten is helping. The way Dora had taken to mothering him is sleeping very sweet. I also lay down with Obie for a while today, who was very happy about that.
Perfect Kitten
He's demanding, it's surprising house loud a creature that's 2 pounds, 9 ounces, makes! He wants out of the bathroom and into the yoga room with one of us. CK's den is fine too, he spent much of the afternoon in there with her.
Mostly he wants to be held. Bursts of kitten exuberance, old shoelaces are the best, but mostly snuggles. Right now he's trying to eat my hoodie tie.
He loves you get up on our shoulders!
We've introduced him to the dogs. Dora became Momma Dog, she had a litter years ago, and groomed him. He was unafraid of her and was playing!
Bertie will take more work. He's so over excited that he jumps up still.
CK posted online that he's perfect. I'm really glad since I feel like I keep being there one with unplanned creatures that fall in love with me and I them!
He's such a good antidote to the incoming winter blues alongside another COVID shutdown.
Kitten Day
Today I finally got to bring home the tiny kitten our friend fostered and I fell for. When CK meet him he wasn't quite the same, but today he put his paw on her forehead as she leaned over to look at him and now she's as smitten as I was.
He's loudly crying right now because I spent a little time with him while brushing my teeth. It's good first night all alone and my heart breaks a little, but we're being strong and are going to try and get him to have a bedtime routine.
Given the surging COVID totals and mayhem being caused by the GOP, T* still hasn't conceded, a day with a new kitten is really welcome.
Midweek Holidays and Other Interruptions
Today's Veterans' Day. I thought about my Father and the tangle of bluster and myth he told about his time in the Navy and his "Service Connected Disability".
I've read paperwork that came to me when he died. He'd actually been drinking on duty, but it still came out for him. The VA's attempt to treat his back created more problems. He was also emotionally and mentally unstable his whole life, making frequent in-patient stays in the psychiatric ward at the VA here in Portland.
Mostly I tried to keep our day as even as possible. Midweek holidays throw CK off, but we managed to keep both our moods pretty even today by checking in. I was disappointed with dinner, mine was kind of experimental and it turned out edible enough.
We made some mutual progress on basement cleanup. CK continued on with her project to build us a NAS. It's already built and now she's going through old hard drives and is moving the data onto the NAS she built out of mostly spare parts! I started tackling the towers of unsorted stuff around my desk.
My therapist once suggested that my having random areas of unsorted stuff needing attention at some point in the future might not be the failing I feel it is. It might just be how my brain works. I'm not wild about this, I'd like to be a highly organized person who knows where everything is at all times.
Kitten tomorrow! I was sad to discover that while CK and I were talking about hard drives I missed the call to come pick him up today.
Age Five
Today I installed the memory from age five that connects to my belief that I'm worthless, not worth keeping safe. An awful memory where I'm witness to terrible physical abuse.
A side effect of low income housing was seeing the casual abuse that happened all the time. It was the 1970s, no one was thinking about anger management. On top of that were the complicated interplay of poverty and interpersonal violence.
It was an unfair, sometimes brutal time. I learned how to be deeply observant, watching for energy shifts in the unstable adults around me.
Then, as now, I learned on my curiosity, creativity, and wonder to survive.
Extreme Wife-ing
I took care of something unpleasant today that involved talking with the IRS.
I also confirmed that there IRS still is working their way through the backlog of taxes submitted during the period they closed down last spring. Which is to say the 2017 taxes might not be truly lost, just under the pile waiting to come up.
It brought up the Shame Monster and got in the way of making dinner, I got us takeout.
CK spent time telling me what a good job I did, am doing now. That it means more than the job I wasn't able to do well before.
Obie is increasingly social and sweet. I spent some time laying by him in the yoga room.
Disbelief
We both just dragged all day. Obie woke me up at 2:20 for food. I'll order some things tomorrow, possibly morsels to try and speed up the middle of the night feeding.
Why I couldn't go to bed sooner; brain spin preventing me from taking a hot shower. I wanted so many things done for morning.
We're also in this state of disbelief that Biden/Harris won. Not able to fully take it in, so we're just feeling the tremendous load our stress response systems have been under! All weekend food hasn't been very appealing.
T* hasn't conceded. The lawsuits start tomorrow.
A highlight of the day was putting our flagpole mount to use and hanging the Progress Pride Flag.