Death and song…and love…and everything else

A gathering happened today at the Manx Pub on Elgin (I named my cat Manx after that pub).  It was to celebrate the life of John Lavery.  I didn’t know him well, certainly not as well as others in the room.  I still miss him.

We had the opportunity to hear him play two songs…they were beautiful – in words and in spirit.  It was hard to hear his voice, his song – but he was there today.  In the room with us.  You could feel it.

Music has a way of healing and haunting.  It did both for me today.

Then, I came home and resurrected a CD that I have not listened to in a very long time.

untogether by Lori Yates.  I wore it out when I first got it.

One song in particular.  Healing and haunting me at the same time.  Damn music.

 

I loved you like a river

I made myself very clear

Look for me at the shoreline

I’m standing right here

Don’t dismiss it now you don’t need to

–  Sweetest Times

 

Boundaries and comfort….

I have a little cat.  She doesn’t like people much.  Or, at all, really.  You will never see her unless you are a) me, b) living in my house for about a month, c) the vet (which has only happened the once).

She never comes to greet me when I come home.  Most often she hisses at me as I’m walking up the stairs before she sees me.  Her personality bounces well off my other cat who is a larger lumbering tabby with a whining heart of gold….just feed him.  Otherwise, he’s just annoying.

All of this to say, she will come within nose sniffing distance of my hand if she’s feeling generous.  It’s a mood thing.  The ONLY (and I stress that word for a reason) time she will let me really “touch” her is when I’m lying down, either couch or bed.  It’s like she knows when I’m not threatening.  She’ll come up, look for love, walk on my legs taking the short cut rather than around me, and generally lap up any attention I give her.  She doesn’t have to rationalize her behaviour.  She just is.  I accept her.  She’s a great little cat.  I wouldn’t trade her for anything.

She has her boundaries, but they change.  Not that they make sense to me, but they must be instinctively with her for a reason.  She was a little stray when she was given to me.  Just a few weeks old.  I’ve never laid a finger on her (how could I?).  She just is the way she is.