Sammy's obituary ~ on Caturday

Sammy began life as an abandoned kitten, not yet weaned.  One of Donna's co-workers found her on the parking lot where they worked, and Donna was the one willing to take her home and care for her.  Sammy was afraid of bare feet, making me think she must have been kicked by someone's bare feet before that someone tossed her out on a parking lot.  Donna had to feed her with an eye-dropper and eventually teach her how to eat food.

One highlight of her life was the bird in St. Louis who would come "talk" to Sammy through the screen in the open window.  Sammy made her own special sounds to the bird.  When she and Donna moved to Chattanooga, Sammy met Kiki, but the two were never close friends.  They did learn from each other, though.  Kiki learned to "drink" from a tall glass, after Sammy would sample Donna's water that way.  Before long, the cats had their own "red glass" to drink from (see the photo above).  And Sammy learned from Kiki.  Donna wrote, "She taught Sammy how to love to the best of Sammy's ability.  Sammy has lost much of her feral nature because of watching you and Kiki's so very special relationship."

On her birthday a few days before she died, I gave Sammy a new food dish.  At 19 years old, Sammy was in pain from arthritis in her spine and possibly her kidneys shutting down.  The mobile vet and her assistant came to the house on Thursday, May 28, 2014.  I was stroking Sammy when she died, telling her how much I loved her.

A few hours later, I lowered the blinds, which Donna and I had left permanently open at the bottom for Sammy and Kiki to be able to look out of their house-bound world.  They could see our patio, grass, flowers or rain or snow, people walking by on the sidewalk.  In other words, they could see the "beyond" outside those window panes.  This photo shows Sammy staring out toward where Kiki had gone, making me think she was looking for Kiki to return.  Sammy, too, is now on the other side of those windows.  And the blinds have been lowered.  Rest in peace, Sammy.

Beginning ~ with The Kiss

Pitching My Tent: On Marriage, Motherhood, Friendship, and Other Leaps of Faith ~ by Anita Diamant, 2003, essays

Every Friday night, I kiss my husband.  No matter how tired we are.  No matter what dreadful things we said to each other earlier in the day.  No matter what.  The kiss is neither perfunctory nor passionate.  And yet, even when there are six other people in the room, it is intimate.

All week long, a kiss is just a kiss.  But our Friday-night kiss is something else.  It acknowledges a connection that is ultimately as mysterious as any sunset, as sacred as any psalm.

This is a ritual kiss.  It takes place in the dining room, immediately after we light two new, white candles and sing the blessing that marks the beginning of Shabbat, the Jewish Sabbath.  Candles and kiss are followed by blessings over wine and bread.

Yesterday, I took three boxes of books to trade at the big used book store in town.  I came home with this book.  I've read Diamant's novels The Red Tent (1997), Good Harbor (2001), and Day After Night (2009), so I know she's an excellent writer.  I look forward to digging into this book, after I get moved to St. Louis this weekend.  Here's a description:

Before The Red Tent, before Good Harbor, before and during six books on contemporary Jewish life, Anita Diamant was a columnist.  Over the course of two decades, she wrote essays about friendship and family, work and religion, ultimately creating something of a public diary reflecting the shape and evolution of her life — as well as the trends of her generation.  Pitching My Tent collects the finest of these essays, all freshly revised, updated, and enriched with new material, forming a cohesive and compelling narrative.

Organized into six parts, the shape of the book reflects the general shape of adult life, chronicling its emotional and practical milestones.  There are sections on marriage and the nature of family ("Love, Marriage, Baby Carriage"); on the ties that bind mother and child ("My One and Only"); on the demands and rewards of friendship ("The Good Ship"); on the challenges of balancing Jewish and secular calendars ("Time Wise"); on midlife ("In the Middle"); and on what it means to embrace Judaism in today's culture ("Home for the Soul").

The word "Shekhinah," the rabbinic term for God's presence on earth, is from a Hebrew verb meaning "to pitch one's tent" (according to Karen Armstrong's book The Case for God, p. 376).  Is this related in any way to Diamant's title?  I hope the book gives me a clue.

Gilion at Rose City Reader hosts Book Beginnings on Fridays.  Click here for today's Mister Linky.

TBT ~ "When I Grow Up"

Kiki sitting among boxes from an earlier move

Sorting through old papers and boxes to move has only one redeeming value.  Occasionally I run across something that makes me smile.  Here's what my daughter wrote toward the end of third grade, using her very best penmanship.

When I Grow Up

When I grow up I want to be like my mother.  She doesn't go to work, but she does work.  She works for a man.  He teachs music.  My mother plays the piano very well.  My mother is a room mother this year.  She enjoys having partys for us.  I think I would like to be a room mother when I grow up.  Sandra L. Jacobs

April 29, 1969

That man I worked for, the man who taught music, was A. R. Casavant, well-known in the marching band world.  I played in concert band and marching band under his direction when I was in high school.  When she wrote this, the work I was doing for him was drawing pen-and-ink illustrations for his books on marching bands.  My drawings were used in at least two of his books published in the 1960s.

Here's the Chattanooga High School marching band in action.  I played the glockenspiel, but I can't tell which one is me in this routine we filmed late one afternoon in the fall of 1957 at the stadium of the University of Chattanooga (now the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga).

By the way, my daughter did grow up to be a room mother.  All through their elementary school years, she worked with her children's teachers and school staff.

Words ~ towing the party line

Someone on Facebook said something about "towing the party line," and I had to dash over to my blog to post something about the misuse of the word.  I have visions of someone pulling (towing) something heavy ("the party") on a long line, the way this horse is towing a barge in a canal.

"Toe the line" is an idiomatic expression, according to Wikipedia, meaning either to conform to a rule or standard — or to stand poised at the starting line in a footrace.  I can use this idiom by saying that I expect people to toe the line when it comes to correct word usage.

50 years ago today ~ my dad died

Similar to my dad's grave, but 50 years later.

FLOWERLAND

When Grandpa got died
Us went to him's house
But he wasn't there.

Then Mom let us go
To a beautiful place
With flags everywhere.

But the prettiest spot
Was all covered with flowers
With some up on stands.

We liked it so much
That we asked to go back
To see Flowerland.

— BSJ  6-1-64

My dad died on May 27, 1964, exactly 50 years ago today.  We had to hurry to bury him that year, before the Memorial Day weekend.  As I was going through an old box yesterday, I found a 3x5 card on which I had typed this poem.  Using some of their own words, I wrote it from the viewpoint of my twin daughters who had turned four that month.  My son was only 11 months old.  Fifty years ago.  Half a century.  Hard to imagine.

Past, future, present ~ mindfulness

"Do not dwell in the past,

do not dream of the future,

concentrate the mind

on the present moment."

            — Buddha

Sunday Salon ~ three generations

Book just finished

The Enoch Factor: The Sacred Art of Knowing God ~ by Steve McSwain, 2010, religion, 9/10

Best quote:  "Is attending your church, synagogue, mosque, or temple helping you be a better and more compassionate person, spouse, neighbor, employee, and employer?  Is it leading you to understand yourself, to know what ego has done and is doing in you, your thinking, your relationships, and so forth, to experience a transformational shift in consciousness, 'to over come the world,' as Jesus put it?  If not, then my advice is this:  Stop going!  Go somewhere else or find another religion altogether.  Better yet, give up on reeligion entirely" (p. 191).

Currently reading

Writing a Woman's Life ~ by Carolyn G. Heilbrun, 1988, women's studies

Description:  "In this modern classic, Carolyn G. Heilbrun builds an eloquent argument demonstrating that writers conform all too often to society's expectations of what women should be like at the expense of the truth of the female experience.  Drawing on the careers of celebrated authors including Virginia Woolf, George Sand, and Dorothy Sayers, Heilbrun illustrates the struggle these writers undertook in both work and life to break away from traditional 'male' scripts for women's roles."

Up next?

Revelations: Diaries of Women ~ edited by Mary Jane Moffat and Charlotte Painter, 1974, women's studies

After typing the information about Writing a Woman's Life (above), I slipped it back onto the shelf with my books on women's studies.  That's when I noticed I had shelved it beside a book about women's diaries.  Synchronicity, since I don't have a particular order within my broader categories:  theology, scriptures of the world's religions, women's studies, etc.  It would make sense to read it next, but it's over 400 pages long — so not likely one I'll want to read right away.  I may choose a novel, for lighter reading, or maybe.......

More likely up next

The Great Transformation ~ by Karen Armstrong, 2006

--- or ---

The Case for God ~ by Karen Armstrong, 2009

Since I'm studying Twelve Steps to a Compassionate Life by Karen Armstrong (2010) with my Book Buddies group, I'll probably read one of these two books by Karen Armstrong which are on my bookshelves.  If I can find them after the move, that is.

GENERATIONS

When asked where he was going to put his new baseball trophy, my 3-year-old great-grandson Jaxon said, "Next to my soccer trophy."  He loves playing sports.

This one speaks for itself, except to add that she's my granddaughter.

One of my daughters and her husband have been married 34 years, as of yesterday.

Bloggers gather in the Sunday Salon — at separate computers in different time zones — to talk about our lives and our reading.