drive it till the wheels fall off March 30, 2006
Katherine has gone off to turn in her Appellate brief, which is one of the forms of torture inflicted on first-year law students. They insist that they are not trying to drum people out in the first year, but I am not entirely convinced. The brief is like a scavenger hunt, because the material involved is beyond what is taught to first year students. It’s an exercise in flying by the seat of your pants, and somehow I managed to do OK on it, so I have no doubt she will too.
We had a talk about Ellis’ acting out.
“What do you think I should do?”
“Give him away to another family and don’t tell them he’s evil.”
“I could never do that. I’d rather buy new glasses every week.”
“Then let’s take him on a long drive in the country.”
“He’d find his way back.”
“You’re right. He’s the devil. And he knows a good thing when he sees it.”
The problem could be solved by installing some kind of kitty door so he can get in and out without human assistance. Then he wouldn’t do bad things to get our attention. The down-side of that is, if he isn’t checked when he comes in the door, he will bring his half-dead victims inside and demonstrate torture techniques in front of us. My children’s grandfather was a veterinarian and I once asked him why cats did that. He said that cats and dogs are fundamentally different creatures. Dogs want you to take care of them and they want to please you. Cats think they are taking care of you, and they don’t care what you think of them. When a cat drags a mouse up and tortures it in front of you, he is doing two things. He’s trying to feed you and he’s trying to show you how to hunt. A completely dead mouse will not do for the hunting lesson, it’s got to have some life in it so he can show you how to kill it. You can’t discourage them from this behavior, because they take no notice of whether you are pleased. Good lord, nature is rude!
Shannon went to her doctor yesterday and found that her heart was in arrythmia. A few years ago, she had open heart surgery to correct a problem with her heart valves. Since then, she has twice undergone a procedure which we call “rebooting.” It involves shocking her heart with electricity to get the valves opening and closing in the right rhythm. Her doctor said the favored treatment right now is to do nothing and let the arrythmia continue as long as it does not cause any other problems. She doesn’t want to get rebooted again, and I don’t blame her. She is understandably depressed, so we comiserated today on the phone.
“God, woman. What’s going on with us? We’re falling apart.”
“It’s amazing that we can still pull it together on the outside.”
“I guess it’s a wonder it didn’t happen before now.”
Getting older is like some kind of 12-step program. You first have to admit it and admit that you are powerless over it. You apologize to all the people you love for the inconvenience your impending dotage is causing for them. You end up by deciding to take it one day at a time, trying to make each day a good one. When it comes to your body, you really don’t have a choice. You have to drive it till the wheels fall off.
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- Author : dangerblond
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