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March 3, 1999 |
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the kingdom of the one-eyed |
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March 3, 1999 Newburyport boat ramp
Copyright © 1999, Janet I. Egan |
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Sadie, the one-eyed black and white female, loves to play even if she doesn't like to be held. When I was finished with the dishes, I got out one of those cat toys that's a long strip of cloth fastened to a flexible plastic shaft and sort of waved it around in the general direction of Strawberry, Wendy, Downey and Pocono to get them out of their cage and moving around. Pocono was mildly interested and was the first one out of the cage. Eventually the others joined her. Pretty soon I had a whole big audience of cats, all observing and trying to catch the thing but not quite making it. Suddenly Sadie jumped out from behind the credenza, grabbed the toy, yanked it out of my hand and ran off with it. Pocono and all the others went running after it. It was the funniest thing. Finally, Sadie looked back and realized all these other cats were chasing her newfound prize so she nonchalantly dropped it where she was and pranced off to the laundry room leaving the other cats staring at it waiting for it to move again. Pretty cool for a one-eyed cat! Mr. H. showed up to pick up several cases of food for the ferals. We were all kind of surprised given that he was in the hospital last week. We all felt like we should help him haul the cat food out to the car, but he said he didn't need any help. Glad he's back to normal. You never know when there's a feral kitten needing to be trapped and socialized. Maybe we should check Mr. H's pockets for felines. Sadie wasn't the only one with vision problems today. I managed to break my glasses while wiping off a smudge of ketchup I dripped on them at lunch. Before your brain short circuits trying to visualize how I got ketchup on my glasses, I should mention that I had taken them off and set them on the counter so I could read the paper while I ate. Evidently there was ketchup on the counter. Anyway, the frame broke - metal fatigue. The right lens no longer had any metal to support it. Talk about one-eyed! Eek. I asked the owner of the diner where was the nearest optical shop and walked on over there in a blur. For some reason, my vision seemed worse than it normally does without glasses. I guess the thought of not being able to drive home had some effect. But the optician found some frames that would fit my lenses and I picked the second cheapest one. He put the lenses in and I was back in business. By this time I wasn't really much in the mood for looking for birds but having just bought a huge dark roast coffee at Fowles I stopped at the boat ramp to drink it. I'm there sipping my very hot coffee and getting over what a close call that was with the glasses when I looked up at the sky. Two hawks locked talons right above the boat ramp. One was definitely a red-tailed hawk and the other looked really pale for a red-tail. Two women in a car parked next to mine were watching the fight - if it was a fight and not a mating dance - intently. They asked what I thought the pale one was. I thought it had to be a red-tail because, well, it had the characteristic red tail. I dug the book out of my backpack and looked it up. Sure enough, there's a pale morph of the red-tailed hawk. By this time the two hawks had let go of each other and gone their separate ways. It was a pretty impressive sight. |
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