rock and roll musings by Tim Byrnes

Saint Francis is a Sissy: Why Animals Are Better Than People

     Living in what's essentially the ghetto in a primarily agrarian community (our zipcode is EIEIO) one sees all types of lives being led. There's the Fundamentalist Christian family who's homeschooled kids can't spell 'cat' and who's patriarch is often heard loudly, very loudly, calling said kids things I wouldn't call Nixon. There's the 4 Mexican migrant workers living in my old apartment who don't speak a word of English but we communicate through the shared love of animals. Every morning after I put on the coffee I walk Buster (yes, we have a yard now, but old habits die hard). I also have a pocketfull of dry cat food for the neighborhood strays. The other day, walking Buster past my old apartment I saw a beautiful thing: a full grown Chow w/4 six week old kittens curled up around her.

     I'm a sucker for kittens, animals in general. Anyway, I fill a small bowl w/food for the kittens as one of the workers comes out on the porch. He smiles, I smile, I pantomime handing food out to the barncats and he waves. I go back to the house to get some hot dogs for the chow and the 3 other dogs who are owned, but neglected by neighbors. On my way back to the dogs, here comes my smiling Mexican friend holding the biggest watermelon I've ever seen, handing it to me saying 'Gracias'. It made my day.

     Basically every morning I tend to Buster, Sammy, MacDugal and Bleeker as well as these new 4 kittens and their mamadog (I've named them Matthew, Mark, Luke and Ringo and the mamachow Brian Epstein), then there's Little, a miniature collie who's brother the owners let starve to death. Sarah, a white poodle who's owners never check on. She's cooped up in 3 sided garage w/board nailed to the front. I have to throw the food and water down to her. I've offered to take her but the owner always gets a little mad. Bet I could buy her.

     Then there's the cat contingency. Miss Patches is the matriarch, a sweet old lady who runs up to me and Buster the minute she sees us, as does her daughter Camille, a grey and white tazmanian devil, evil cat. I love her. Following her are her 3 kittens, Batman, Supergirl and Bottlebrush (you've just gotta see this kittens tail to understand the name). They all live in a shed and are owned by the same folks as Sarah, so I've adopted them in their own defense. Then along comes Speedy, a hopped up orange male who made friends w/Buster before me. He used to 'follow' us on our walks, running ever decreasing circles around us. I hope to have him in the house by winter as he's clearly MY cat now. Brought him into the house last week. MacDougal walked by w/no problem, but Old Bleeker ran him out, beating him like a rug. Maybe in a week or 2 Speedy'll want a rematch, but for now I feed him out back.

   Then there's Henry, Stratton and Handsome. Older cats whove been abandoned by other tenants, all of whom moved out in the middle of the night sticking my landlord w/a bill and our neighborhood w/these animals. These cats won't come to me, understandably, they've all been fucked by humans, so I leave dryfood out around the surrounding woods and behind my apartment. Somehow we all get fed. No matter how angry life makes me, and anyone who knows me even a little knows I get stupid angry sometimes, I can't help but smile when any of these aforementioned critters comes running up to me. Glad to see me. Happy, even.

      Yeah, I suspect it's all about the food for them but the joy is real. The feeling I get when I do something as simple as feed a stray cat offsets all the evilthought crap I roil around in my head regarding the concept of truth and it's illusory existence etc. etc. It's the only exchange I participate in that is what it is. A man feeding a cat. No agendas, know small talk full of lies, nobody trying to sell anybody anything, no politics, no religion, no devil, no god.

     When I die, as I suppose I must, I wish I could just have my body thrown into the woods so I could feed the animals one last time. We should all do that. Hell, we've eaten enough of them.

Posted by: timbyrnes at 17:21 | link | comments (2)

Comments:

#1  24 August 2006 - 19:35

 

"Saint Francis is a Sissy: Why Animals Are Better Than People"

I thought you were going to talk about your voting record, not about cats.

Jim

Anonymous

#2  25 August 2006 - 16:26

 

Well, then, as usual you were wrong.

Anonymous

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