| THIS IS A READ-ONLY ARCHIVE FROM THE SORABJI.COM MESSAGE BOARDS (1995-2016). |
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i woke up "early" today. i was at "work" before eight am. i accepted a "letter of assignment". i filled out a "british work permit application". i read a "document". i ate lunch with work people. i heard jokes about bin laden. they called it mom's potato salad but it wasn't. i drank a rum and diet pepsi from a winnie the pooh pint glass, in a pint glass: half way up ice half way up whalers dark rum top off with diet pepsi i drank a blue sky "ginger gale" and rum from a winnie the pooh pint glass, in a pint glass: one point five inches ice half way up whalers dark rum top off with blue sky "ginger gale" soft drink i smoked copious amounts of ganja (as they might say in the movies.) i buried a cat today. just before puberty i began digging a hole in the far corner of my parents' backyard. back where i used to build forts before i was too old to build forts; back behind the apple and plum trees, where the apricot used to be. i dug this hole out of the hard adobe with a pick and a shovel. it took me a month. fucking adobe. it took me a month to get a hole i could stand in. as deep as mid-thigh on a thirteen year old. we had a little black dauschund. the runt of the litter, we were told. german dog, dauschunds, so we'll name her gretel, we were told. little black dauschund with little brown eyebrows and patches of elephant skin. she had these soft puffs just where her ears met the back of her head. i once saw her bloated after eating a box of super-chip chocolate chip cookies. the whole thing, she looked like a football nearly bursting. about the time i stopped digging my hole, gretel was dying. her hips went. she threw a disc in her back. her elephant skin was taking over. her teeth were falling out and her kibble would squeek as she ate it. my brother would take her out and introduce her to my hole. we eventually put her down and buried her in that hole. i nailed together a cross out of two strips of scrap wood and marked her grave. my dad cut down the apple tree and then the plum tree. they planted a giant lavetera bush, but never took down the cross. today i buried a cat. yesterday my roommate came home and said, "nate, do you know there is a dead cat in a box outside your gate?" uh, no. i went out side, opened my front gate, and there it was. a black cat with white belly white paws, dead in a box. a cat i've seen before, a neighborhood cat. not my cat. dead. i look at it for a minute. legs are weird, paws facing in odd directions. must have been hit by a car. but why would someone put a dead cat in a box in front of my house? i go back in the house. i tell my roommate, "there's a dead cat just outside the gate." yeah, he knows. i call the sheriff, "uh, yeah. i have a dead cat in a box out front my house. uh, no i don't know if it is malicious. no, i doubt it. i don't know, i just thought you might want to know. yeah, i'll dispose of it." i didn't even want to look at it again. i go have sex. phone rings to voicemail. time passes i forget about the cat. i go to make a phone call realize there's voicemail. it's my next-door neighbor, angel. "uh, hi nate, this is angel from next door. there's a dead cat in a box out in front of your house. i hope it's not yours, kid." click. i'm sitting in the la-z-boy, laptop in lap, working. i'm facing the front door's twelve windows. i hear a yell. it's the neighbor boy. i call him little man. he might be in the nine years old region. he has his head stuck through my fence and is yelling something at me. i get up and open the door. "what?" "dude, your cat is dead." "no she's not." "yeah, dude, your cat is dead in a box out there." he indicates the other side of my gate. "no, she's right there." i indicate the fat tortiseshell watching us from just inside the house. "come check out this dead cat in a box, then." "ok." i meet the boy just outside my front gate and we look at the dead cat for awhile. he doesn't look like he was hit hard, just his feet are at odd angles. i imagine picking him up, pose stiff with rigor mortis. i cringe. "i wonder who'd put a dead cat in a box in front of my house." i wonder aloud. "wasn't us!" the kid is adamant. i thought they'd done it. i decided to leave the cat out overnight. i figured if a coyote didn't come and drag it away, i could shovel it into the trash when i put the cans to the curb. in the morning i stepped over a dead cat in a box on my way to my car. nothing had disturbed it over night. i drove to work. when i got home the cat lay still. someone had put some dirt on top of it. a bit of redwood needles lay on its side. i dragged the cans outside the gate. recycling and trash. i put the trash can next to the dead cat and went for a shovel. i looked at the cat. a few cars drove by. i put the trash can next to the recycling can, down the street a bit. i went back inside my yard. wearing my black, shiny, silver-buckled patent leather work shoes i dug a suitable hole in hard earth of my front yard. from the front window a fat tortiseshell sat tall and attentive, watching. she didn't move, the tortie, when i stopped digging and went for the dead cat. i planned on shoveling the corpse into the hole, but decided to lift it in its box instead. i carried it into my yard, slid the dead cat into the hole. the two front legs, rigor mortised towards the sun, looked like they might breach the surface when the hole was filled. i gently rearranged the dead cat with the shovel, filled the hole, covered the mound with flagstones. i buried a cat today. |
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makes me think of a brautigan story. im not sure which one though. |
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And Morris,heed my words: "You shouldn't,either." |
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The next morning I took him in to be put down, he was the family dog, but I didn't have school until 10, and everyone else had to be somewhere at 8, so I took him in. I didn't go to school that day, and I could barely see through my eyes to drive home. They cremated him, and put him in this little green and blue can, I thought it wasn't right and that it looked like a cookie can. THe family couldn't decide what to do with the cookie can, and so they left it on the mantle. I didn't htink that was right either, he was an outside dog and was outside most of his life, he loved it out there, he'd freak out everytime you let him inside it scared him. I took the can out that night and buried it in a BIG hole in the corner, he worked on that hole since he was a puppy, didn't go anywhere just down, was about 4 feet deep, I think he hit clay. But I buried him. No one even noticed. |
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I always hated that Peanuts. |
Why didn't they just leave a lasagna on your front door? Or Odie. |
And Nate may be alot of things,but he's no squatter. |
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Anyway, Ive had to bury many, many, cats. We own about 8 at the moment but have owned as many as 25 at one time. |
My parents have a ranch in the country and have a total of 7 cats right now. They have lost a lot of them over the years. They also have like 5 horses (better known as the yard ornaments, cuz they don't ride or show or anything anymore). They spent $1,700 when one of the yard ornaments got sick instead of putting it down. Poor horse, died 2 weeks later anyways. |
Too bad it wan't 5 Ded Frogs in a Box. Then it would have been a happy story. Instead, it was different. LS |
A man with millions in the bank who gives you $100 has given you nothing. A man with nothing in the bank who gives you a dollar has given you a fortune. And, both should be thanked greatfully and graciously. |
The second sounds like the distraction for a pickpocket. A man who gives you eternal salvation or triple your money back is J.R. "Bob" Dobbs, Hallejujay! |
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