Kitten Wars 1/2/15: Persona Non Grata in My Own Home

03 Jan 2015 Leave a comment

by Quietude's Junction in journal, Kitten Wars, reflections Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

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I’ve had the best holiday season ever thanks to family and friends. I had my best friend come and stay for a couple of weeks which was fabulous. Both of my cats and my dog were completely spoiled by Dallas. The cats took turns getting loved on by him and would hiss at poor Buddy when he ventured too close. By the end of his visit, Cleo, my normally very sweet, everyone loves me and I love everyone kitty, actually stalked over and swiped her claws across the poor dog’s nose completely confusing him. After all, since she was being petted, why couldn’t Buddy put his big dog head in Dallas’s lap and get some of the same. But the clincher came when I returned from the airport after dropping him off to fly away home. Both cats, not just Cleo, came running to the door with the perfect “pet me” meows echoing through the apartment. Cleo in specific looked at me, then watched in disgust as I closed the door and her favorite petting friend did not come through it after me. She glared in my direction, raised her head as high as it could go with her tail straight up and marched off filled with utter disgust that I had dared to come home without him. Persona NON Grata in my OWN place. Spoiled my pets, he did! It took Buddy almost 3 hours to get over it. He kept going back and forth to my son’s room, then back to the front door looking, waiting for Dallas to come through it. The cats are still trying to decide if I’ll ever be allowed to pet them again. I’m sure they will get over it by breakfast tomorrow.20140720-121721-44241475.jpg

The Rights of a Child

10 Sep 2014 2 Comments

by Quietude's Junction in journal, reflections Tags: , , , , , , ,

At what point does an adolescent lose his individuality, his family, and his being to become one of the masses, the nameless homeless? A student of mine passed last week. Because both of his parents were in jail and no one had been formally assigned guardianship or foster care, he was declared homeless by the nameless government, cremated and ashes sent off to be “taken care of” with no care taken to look to find out if anyone would have been willing to do anything else for him. The students and teachers who loved him were not given the opportunity to have closure.

The funeral home was called repeatedly. They were expecting his body to come their way, but it never showed up. Finally, the coroner was called, but they were too late. My student’s body had already been cremated. No family was contacted because according to them, he was homeless. He had local family, but they were not close. He had friends who would have raised the money. He had teachers who would have footed the bill, but as a whole, no one was contacted because someone in authority declared him homeless.

Today, I’ve been going in and out of outrage, depression, and shock at what just happened to a child. At what point did we as a society declare that it is acceptable to throw away our children, even if it’s only their remains?

Thoughts on “Songbird”

19 Aug 2014 Leave a comment

by Quietude's Junction in journal, reflections Tags: , , , , , , ,

“Songbird” was written in part about an old friend from UGA as well as something that I used to do in the drama building. Back then the theatre people and the music people shared the same building. It was an old lady with beautiful granite/marble stairwells that echoed perfectly. I was extremely shy back then, but those stairwells called to me as nothing else did. Whenever I would have a lull between classes and knew that no one should be going up to the third floor, I would sing songs that filled my heart. As soon as I heard someone open one of the doors, I would scatter through the closest of the four doors to either the outside, basement, lobby, or third floor and make myself scarce. I tried assiduously to not get caught. In the five years I was there, I was only caught singing once by someone who had a feeling it was me. He literally timed me out of one of my classes just to verify that it was indeed me singing in the stairwell. It was then that I found out that he and several others had been listening to me sing for quite sometime. I was thoroughly embarrassed at being caught, but extremely thrilled that someone was listening considering that I was truly only singing because those stairwells begged for it.

The old friend that actually brought the story to mind was one who would play jazz and ragtime on the practice pianos. In my story, James is him in my mind, all grown up. My friend would play at all times of day and night changing pianos each time. He couldn’t help playing any more than I could stop singing. It was who we were at that time. He wore a brown trench coat, a long grey-tan scarf, and I believe a fedora, but it could have been another style of hat. He was always dressed as nicely as he could be. Despite the obvious quality of his clothes, they were threadbare and patched. He carried himself with a natural pride of knowing who he was, even when he was diligently watching for any night watchmen. It was several month before I ventured into the practice room where he was playing “Tea for Two” and introduced myself. Actually, I should say that he introduced himself, as I was too shy to say much of anything. I believe he knew I had been sitting close by listening for quite a while as he nodded at me like an old friend.

We sat saying nothing as he went through all sorts of ragtime, jazz, and blues. After a while, I sang softly to something he was playing, he grinned and from then on played things that I might know. It wasn’t until a good while later that I found out that my extremely talented friend had been living where ever he could for the last few years. He had put his degree on hold due to a family misfortune and was all alone in the world. As I was living in an all girl’s dorm, I had nothing to offer him other than a warm meal and friendship. He took the friendship, declining food, saying that I was a student, too and couldn’t afford it.

So, “Songbird” was made for that time, that place. It is a mix of what could have happened, could have been.