Bentley was SUCH a good boi!

 

Our beloved Bentley was SUCH a good boi at the vet's today! It was completely different from all his other experiences, where he'd be terrified and would meow pitifully through the whole examination. Our old clinic closed permanently, perhaps because the facilities were just too primitive by today's standards (one big loud dog-smelling waiting area with barks, howls, jumping around, etc. while Bentley, who has an exquisite sense of smell, would cower in the back of his carrier).

Well, that clinic was closed, so I began to look around for something else close by (he hates those car rides!). I found a local clinic, newly-built, that literally has TWO clinics: one for cats and one for dogs. The cat clinic even has a separate entrance! I noticed Bentley stopped his pitiful meowing when we came in, and even came out of the carrier without trauma. He sniffed around and got used to the place while the vet took his history from  us. She was lovely, obviously loved cats, felt him all over and told us what we had so hoped to hear - at nine years old, he's pretty much in perfect health. He has even lost a little weight from his very large frame. 

Best of all was the way the clinic understood cats and their particular needs, their hypersensitivity and how they can be intimidated by larger, louder, smellier animals. Bentley was attacked and ripped up quite badly by a dog before we adopted him, so naturally his fears are even greater. But it all went so smoothly, it only cost $100.00, and I have no qualms about taking him back there if, God forbid, anything happens with his health

He was SUCH a good boi! Even better, when we got home he actually crawled back into his carrier and loafed for a while. Now THAT is a first. 

Holy Crappoly! Look what I found! (or: the Methigel Column)

Holy crappoly. Look what I found!

I wrote this in, I think, 1995.

It appeared, or it must have, in the Tri-City News, the paper I wrote for for years and years and years. I remember it because I had to beg for my cheques. Then one day, after 15 years of service, they casually canned me for no reason they would state.

Them's the breaks. But here it is, this thing I found while trying to find my Google Author's Profile, which is right now having a nervous breakdown on Internet Explorer and flashing and jerking all over the place. I found it on some forum-or-other, and who knows where the person ever got it. It's almost like finding one of my columns from the (choke) Hinton Parklander!

The cat, whom I've written about before, is long since dead, though I was sentimental enough to make a scrapbook of his best photos, vet records and a lock of his fur (just kidding - I found enough of that on the furniture to not want to see it ever again).

"Methigel is extremely palatable," the directions on the tube of
medication said. "To stimulate taste interest place a small amount of
Methigel on animal's nose or directly in mouth. Cats: 1/2 to 1
teaspoonful twice daily. Dogs: 1 teaspoonful twice daily."

To me, it looked like old beef gravy which had been allowed to harden
into a quivering semi-solid. To my cat ... well, when I unscrewed the
top of the tube, he took one sniff and ran the other way.

I don't blame kitty for his critical response. Cats loathe medicine,
especially the really noxious stuff. Murphy hates it, just as he hates
to admit that with the onset of middle age he has developed certain
urinary problems familiar to 50-year-old males everywhere.

There is a treatment: Methigel. But why are the manufacturers so
insensitive as to suggest that this stuff is equally "palatable" to
cats and dogs? That's like saying a medicine is suitable for guppies
and giraffes. Frogs and finches. Amoebae and antelope.

Everyone knows there is a world of psychic difference between a cat
and a dog. Just take a look at their owners.

Dog people wear thick Cowichan sweaters, smoke three-dot Brigham pipes
(even women), drink Dewar's White Label, read Hemingway, and sit by
the fire with their faithful pal at their feet. They like to be in
control - of their dogs.

Cat people wear claw-marked cashmere, gave up smoking years ago (Tabby
doesn't like it), drink whatever will get them there fastest, read
Dorothy Parker, and know enough to sit very still so Precious will
deign to jump up and snuggle. They love to be in control - but not of
their cats, who can bite and hiss and scratch and still be named
"Cuddlebug".

Murphy eyed me with mistrust. "I suppose you think I'm going to take
this greasy gunk without a fight," he stated as I prepared an oral
syringe full of the dreaded methigel.

"No, but I do expect you to take it," I countered, grasping 16 pounds
of cat between my knees for the twice daily struggle.

"Good for cats and dogs? Bah -," Murphy spat, decorating the wall with
most of the dose. "A dog will eat coffee grounds."

He's right, you know. I've seen it. Dogs aren't fussy. In fact,
they'll lick up any old swill with the greatest of enthusiasm, then
sit up and beg for more.

Dogs are prose; cats are poetry. Dogs embody the spirit of rugged
manhood. Cats are the spooky eccentricity of woman. Dogs doggedly
follow. Cats disappear.

I'm writing to the manufacturer of this medicine to suggest a change.
"Methigel for Cats?" No, let's call it Tuna Delight, a tasteful puree
of assorted fish-heads.

There will be a twist to the instructions. Before the owner is allowed
to administer the first dose, he or she must swallow a full
tablespoonful.

Good for cats. Humbling for humans.

Post-blog: Aren't you glad I took that Creative Writing course at Pinetree Elementary School in 1996? Since then, my prose has soared to new heights. Speaking of fish, this piece is suitable for wrapping it. But hey, I thought it was way good at the time!

Post-post: Just dredged up this bit of writerly nonsense. Showing off again, are we?

If a fish is the movement of water embodied, given shape, then cat is a diagram and pattern of subtle air.”
 - Doris Lessing

http://margaretgunnng.blogspot.ca/2013/04/the-glass-character-synopsis.html

http://members.shaw.ca/margaret_gunning/betterthanlife.htm

Rocky's last stand

Dreams are strange things - no, scratch that, MY dreams are strange things. Slippery, often incomprehensible, with imagery out of some Salvadore Dali painting (or sometimes Van Gogh), they usually defy any sort of interpretation and soon recede into the thick fog from which they presumably came.

Freud called dreams "the royal road to the unconscious", but what did that doofus know? He hated women, said they were incomplete creatures, just castrated men, and couldn't even breathe properly because they breathed upward into their chests. Brilliant doctor that he was, he didn't notice that all his patients were wearing extremely tight corsets (see my corset post, which so far nobody has even looked at).

So Freud was full of shit. Where does that leave us? With the jumble, the ragbag: seeing a giraffe in my back yard (or at least, seeing its head and neck as it leaned over the back fence); going to meet myself at a train station (I never got there); and, last night, something that reeks of significance even if you don't believe in dream symbolism at all.

A dead horse.

It must have been Rocky, my shaggy friend, a non-prepossessing but game little creature with whom I had an intense bond. I've written about Rocky before, and he was an extension of my childhood, the factor that made my pre-teen years bearable. Before we sold him when he got too old and expensive to keep (both boarding and farrier/vet bills were starting to pile up), he was my comfort and solace. I'd longed for a horse as a young girl, and here he was, not exactly a snorting Arabian but nonetheless sweet-natured and dependable.

So when I had this dream, this horse lying on the ground shuddering and apparently breathing his last, it must have been Rocky: I knew that sorrel coat with white stippling through it (for he was a true strawberry roan, just like in the song). I was sitting on the ground leaning over his head and stroking his neck, knowing that a downed horse wouldn't last long and probably should be put to sleep.

Some anonymous people were around (and just who ARE these anonymous people in my dreams? I don't know, they're just there), and I asked them to call a vet. The time had come. His eyes were milky and fixed, and he only breathed once in a while, if at all.

And then.

A big shudder ran through him, and he performed that motion that horses have been doing since time immemorial: starting with his front legs, he began to heave himself back on his feet.

Foals do this when they are born, if awkwardly. It's a practiced movement, and kind of impressive to watch. But this was like literally watching a horse come back to life.

He seemed fine. His eyes were warm and bright again (Rocky always had what horsemen call "a kind eye"), and he started wandering around looking for stray wisps of hay. Soon he'd be lipping them up and chewing with that gratifying hollow crunching sound. All seemed well.

And then: the vet arrived, a woman in a white coat literally wielding a giant syringe with squirts coming off it. "Don't kill him, he's fine!" I protested. She looked at him, then looked at me as if tempted to use the syringe on me instead.

Then the dream sort of wandered into weirdland: the vet hitched up a crude sort of wagon with chains instead of reins. Then she made another one for me, but the chains were all wrong, different lengths, and I had no control. There did not seem to be a horse involved, so I am not sure what was supposed to propell this ersatz chariot. She fixed the reins/chains, so it all worked, but WHAT worked? Where were the horses? Why were we doing this?

And that was the end of it, or at least the part of it I remember.

OK then. . . let's get symbolic, shall we? I know it's early in the morning. The dead horse which is not really dead is my "dream" - in another sense (and why do we use the same word? I've never been able to figure that out), my dream of being published again, of feeling like an author instead of a near-totallly-unread blogger wasting my time every day.

It's Rocky, not just any horse.  And I had author dreams from the very beginning, from the first time I realized, with a shock of wonder, that someone actually created these magic carpets I held in my hands.  

It amazes me how little support I've had, as my parents wanted me to be a musician and were automatically disappointed by anything else I did. Now people try to talk me out of wanting to do more. Just be happy with what you have. At the same time, they are constantly saying, "Well. . . ?", a sort of "what have you done lately" thing. What have you done lately to justify all this time and grief?

I learned today that a publisher I had completely given up on is still "considering" my novel. I don't know what to think about this. It's distressing because it has been a very long time and I had almost given up, to the point that I sent them a very strongly-worded email yesterday. I got "a" reply, but nothing definitive. This is not a hand-cranked press, but one that is larger  than anything I would normally deal with.

Will the horse stand up again? Walk around and snuffle for food as if nothing happened? I don't know. I bounce back and forth between excitement and depression/despair. I tell myself not to hope.

The picture of Rocky and I at the top of this post was taken in our front yard in Chatham in about 1966.  It has a misty surrealism that I love. The four corners of the original, which is one of those old Instamatic things that's barely  2" x 3", were cut off, maybe to fit into a small frame. I know almost nothing about photoshopping, but in this case I really wanted to restore it. If you look very closely at the corners you might see evidence that I didn't know what I was doing: the program was a strange one that plastered "cloned" material on the photo surface like a paint roller. But when I was done, it seemed to pop out at me in 3D in the eerie way of very old photos (such as the header on this blog, also taken in my front yard).

Rocky didn't like being tied in the back yard - in fact, I didn't tie him at all, just left him loose without saddle or bridle or anything - and while we were having dinner he nudged the gate open and took off. Never had he run at such a clip. He galloped all the way back to the barn while we feverishly  pursued him in the family station wagon. I remember my father saying, "I never knew that horse could run so fast."

When he reached his destination (the barn) with unerring accuracy,  he stopped dead as if putting brakes on his hoofs and moseyed on over to a bale of hay.

What does it all mean? Oh, probably nothing. I'm just trying to make my Wednesday a little more bearable.

http://margaretgunnng.blogspot.com/2012/01/synopsis-glass-character-novel-by.html

http://members.shaw.ca/margaret_gunning/betterthanlife.htm