Susan

Susan Begg 1950-2019

I found her in her bedroom.  Hugger, her cat, had been in the window, calling for help for a few days and finally, the humans in the world had gotten smart enough to go into the apartment to check on her.  She had stopped answering her phone when we called and had not been pleasant to the neighbors that had checked on her; and so we had all backed off to let her figure out what she wanted to do.  This was apparently it.  

Fiercely independent, she died in a way of her own choosing, in the apartment that she loved. We don't really know the cause of her death, whether she had fallen or perhaps had a seizure or a heart attack due to her drinking; the bureaucratic world has made everything very slow for us "not-blood-kin", but indeed she was dead, and we had to deal with the aftermath.  One of the positives is that I had to go through her books and her METICULOUSLY saved letters to and from everyone in her life.  She had important poems and essays clipped to all of her lamp shades.  She had a million photos and journals and lists.  She also had all of the things that her mom had saved, which were just as meticulously identified and preserved as Susan's things.  Lord, Susan was as much a pirate as any of the cats in my life.  (She, being a Navy type would probably really resent my saying this, but it's true, she leapt into people's lives, took them hostage with poetry and a mischievousness that was anchored deep in her being. She held them with her brilliance, her kindness, her sense of fun and a loving heart that could touch a wide variety of people. When she had to leave, she did just that, and you were left with a maelstrom of feelings.)  

And so, she has left us for the last time.

On September 15 it was discovered that the Outrageous Susan Begg had exited this world to attend to whatever adventure awaited in the next one. She was born with at least five lives, perhaps not the requisite nine of feline fame, but definitely more than one.

 She started out a Navy brat, born on July 31, 1950, into a Navy family to Chief Warrant Officer Robert Begg and Renie Begg.  When they were stationed in the States, she spent some of her childhood in Bucksport, Maine, which was the favorite Begg gathering place.  Although most of her childhood was spent overseas and on Adak Island in Alaska, she always felt that tie to Maine.   In all of these places, she learned to love the sea, world travel, and eventually, single malt scotch.

Her next life took her to Smith College where, amidst other brilliant women, she found that she also loved women.  Pretty much all of them. 

Life number three found her enrolled in the Cornell Veterinary School. She thrived and excelled!  She was dubbed “Boomer” by one professor and did her best to live up to the name.  She found another smart woman with whom she would be involved both personally and professionally as she moved out into the world. 

In life number four she did an internship at the prestigious American Medical Center in New York City, and then a residency in Pathology at Cornell. She worked for a few years in Buffalo and then weaseled her way back to Ithaca, leaving a string of broken hearts behind her.  She worked at Briar Patch Veterinary Hospital until she didn’t.  Then she started her own business, Vet Express, where she became loved by every client who needed her to come to their house and attend to their beloved pets.

At this point, the lives she led became somewhat entwined.  Alcoholism followed her from Life #2 until the end of her life. She became very involved with 518.  This relationship was very important to her.  When she was her best self, it was when she had an outside structure, and 12 Step was a powerful influence on her.  She played softball and rugby; she became a fire fighter­­-- a job of which she was particularly proud.  She joined the Unitarian Universalists.  

Then, finally, studying and working incredibly hard, she returned to the sea by joining the Merchant Marine.  In many ways, she felt that she had come home. In each of these lives she found families of friends, lovers, team mates, neighbors and coworkers, all of whom will miss her. She is survived by her cousin, Jane Paxton, by her sweet cat, Hugger, and by a small group of longtime friends—Team Susan--who knew her for decades, and supported her for the last few years of her life.

Starting in 2016, she began to suffer from the beginning stages of an Alzheimer’s-like dementia.  Sometimes she could roll with it, telling friends to call her moments before they arrived at her house because she “couldn’t remember shit”.  As her memory failed more and more, she became increasingly depressed.  She grieved for her mother who died in 2007, but always told people that she was blessed by the friends who rallied around her.  She struggled with her old demons. 

Later it became obvious that most of Susan had headed out to sea, leaving us with a pale imitation of her former, larger than life, self.  Like the Unsinkable Molly Brown, the Outrageous Susan Begg has pulled herself out of the water and charmed her way into the next adventure.

A memorial service will be held at 3:00pm on November 16, 2019, at the First Unitarian Society, 306 N. Aurora St., Ithaca, NY.  In lieu of flowers, please make a donation to Ithaca Community Recovery, 518 W Seneca St., Ithaca, NY 14850.

      

The First Girl I Loved, Part One

It's odd that this should be my first post of 2018.  Odd that I haven't written for so long.  Some other day I will tell you why, but maybe that is why I haven't written.  I don't know the whole answer yet.

Anyway, on my way through my documents looking for the recipe for Tuna Brownies--yep, that's what I said, Tuna Brownies--I came upon something that I wrote a few computers ago and managed, through the magic of computer guys, to save.  (Tuna Brownies are actually part of another story that puts my Lukas in the limelight.)

So, I came upon the first chapter of something I have always wanted to write.  I do tend to do that, write first chapters--or titles.  I have lots of titles, most of them written down on little pieces of paper from the age of no computers.  But I digress.

This little story is true and doesn't even have a specific animal in it, unless you count four year old humans.  It's all true and no names have been changed to protect the innocent.

I think the first girl I loved was Colleen Zimmerman.  Why did she speak to my heart so?  I was three when she moved in next door.  I had a friend—Betty Rather—with whom I’d played since I was two.  But Colleen’s yard bordered mine and her house was built just like mine.  And there was something magic about her and her family and the twin, two-story houses that we lived in then.  I wanted people to believe that she was my sister.  I was a little blond girl, somewhat beer barrel shaped, with her hair in mandatory, pathetically thin braids.  Colleen was a skinny little thing...with longer braids of normal thickness. We weren't fooling anybody.  I spent as much time as I could with her. 

The Zimmermans were perfect for us, with a kid just the right size and gender for each of us.  They had an extra girl, older than all of the rest of us, but I don't think she minded being excluded.  Sometimes we all played together, shooting games mostly, lots of ducking and dying, although one famous variety show, staged in my garage, remains in my memory. Sometimes the four youngest girls became the Lennon sisters, singing siblings from the Lawrence Welk Show.  (I insisted that I be Janet, the youngest of the performing siblings, so Colleen, because she was 3 months younger than me, had to be Mimi, (the actual fifth Lennon sister, who only sporadically performed).  "Kathy" was somehow always on vacation when we performed.  I know now why I refused to be Kathy.  She seemed too much like a grown up.  I had no desire to be a grown up.  I'm not sure that I want to be one now.

Sometimes all the kids in the neighborhood gathered for frozen tag.  For Colleen and I there were dolls and countless pretend games, homes and stores and restaurants and schools, all in my garage. We rescued birds from our cats, caring for them as well as we could, and having elaborate funerals for the victims that didn't survive.  Somewhere in the yard beside Colleen's old garage, there is a metal breadbox with a sparrow skeleton.  

There were sleepovers that we tried to make last as long as possible, one time pretending to sleep until lunch time so that she could eat at my house and we could stay together into the afternoon.  Mind you, our houses were only a few feet apart and there wasn’t any reason that we couldn’t just play together outside.  But, for me, if we slept in the same house, it was more like belonging together.  On Christmas mornings we could run over to each other’s house in our pajamas to compare the haul and to envision the games that would grow out of those gifts.  And when our sisters grew up enough for a summer of playing canasta, we teased them for having become incredibly boring. 

One time, when I had done something that Colleen didn’t like, she stopped being my friend for a hideously long time, maybe as long as a week.  It was the summer after 3rd grade, for me, and I remember yearning after her, heartbroken, certain that I had lost her forever and certain that this was important forever.  I remember standing in my yard calling out to her as she crossed the street to play with the boys that lived over there (that we didn’t even like that much) and wondering if I would survive this. When she deigned to forgive me I was careful to remember my transgression so that I never would lose her again.  

She was my best friend, and in some ways I think I measure all of my friends against that first innocent love.  When we were ten years old Colleen's family moved to Iowa and I felt a hollowness that was nearly overwhelming, made worse because she was initially excited about the move and less devastated than I.

That was the first love of my life, the first real loss for my heart to bear.

A (Kinda) Happy Ending, I Think

Well...this chapter doesn't have anything to do with good-byes.  That's a relief.  I began writing it when I was dealing with January and all of its grief.  We had Zuza's surgery date, January 23, come upon us, and really, I was pretty nervous. There are good reasons for doing the surgery beyond my discomfort of seeing that blind eye everyday and being reminded of her mortality.  Untreated, there is a possibility that the "hypermature" cataract could begin to break down, causing inflammation and pain.  She could develop glaucoma, which translates into a lot of pain and the possible removal of her eye.  I realize that it could fit the pirate motif quite well, but she'd have a few things to say about wearing a patch.  And a parrot.  We had been waiting since October for this opening, (which we only got because somebody loves Carolyn up there at the Cornell Vet School), and now we were taking her there at 9:00am for her surgery. 

The first thing that we were told was that, oh no, the actual surgery wouldn't be that day, they would test her and keep her there for three or four days, (!) do the surgery, keep her another day or two, (!) and then we would bring her home.  This was all blithely spoken by the student, who then did some of the tests that I am familiar with.  She had some trouble with them and then admitted that this was her first day on this rotation and she was nervous.  She was actually very sweet, and was relieved that Carolyn was not only a retired vet, but was encouraging and kind to her, and after that didn't try explaining things that Carolyn certainly knew.  When she left, I turned to Carolyn and said that there was no way in hell I was leaving her for the week!! I mean, c'mon, we have a retired vet and a very observant dog mom in the house and...and...and!  Carolyn reassured me that we wouldn't let that happen. Then the resident came in and did everything over again--like they do--and then the grown-up doctor came in and examined Zuza and spoke with us (mostly Carolyn, because she's the real thing), and back came the student to make all the final arrangements.  

Mostly I was worried about the rehab time.  She was going to have to wear a cone of shame for a month, and you know that was going to be ugly. She was going to have a number of eye drops every day, forever--okay, that's doable--and on February 2, she would be 11 years old, going under anesthesia for the umteenth time.  And Luke would be a freaking basket case the whole time she was gone.  But other than that, it was fine.

It was decided that we would leave her there for testing that included ocular ultrasounds and electroretinagrams, and wait for a call around 4:30pm to pick her up, or to drop off her (prescription) food.  Oy.  We went to do errands.  

On a side note--it never occurred to me that one could ultrasound an eyeball, especially a teeny one.  It makes sense, I suppose, but how little is the wand?  Second, I had not heard of an electroretinagram (ERG) before, and it intrigues me that anyone can look through a thick cataract to see what's going on in there.

So, the call came at 2:30.  Hmmmm, early.

We could come pick her up, and they were sorry that she wasn't a candidate for surgery. What?!!  We zoomed back and met "our" student--I was actually getting really fond of her--and got the whole story.  Boiled down to the basics, they wouldn't do the surgery because it wouldn't help her see.  They might have done it if her good eye was perfect, but the retinas in both of her eyes had only minimal function. In fact, they couldn't say how much she was seeing now.  So, the good news is that she didn't have to stay in this very scary place or deal with all of the aftermath of rehab, and we didn't have to plunk down $3000.  The bad news is that my baby girl is going to be blind.  The student said, "You carry her most of the time, right? It won't be that different. She doesn't really need to see."  In some ways she's right. Zuza's nose works great; her ears work, and we have no idea how well she has been seeing, anyway.  She runs joyfully out into the backyard when there is no snow, jumps heroically from her little stairs to Carolyn's chair in the living room, knows the locations of every little bed and waterbowl in my office and at home, panhandles ruthlessly from my clients and the tellers at her favorite bank, and is more than content to experience outside life from inside my jacket.  So it's good, right?

We still have to worry about all of the reasons we based our decision upon in the first place, but in my non-logical heart, I'm not so worried about those things.  I can't even tell you why.  Maybe it's denial, or maybe it's living in the moment, but if I have learned anything from these pirates I love, it's to take one step at a time. Losing them is unspeakably awful, but having them in my life is such pure soul touchingly rich.  So, here I am, training to become her guiding eyes human, while she continues to be my medical alert dog.  Seems fair to me.

The Cat Who Hugs

I want to tell you an absolutely true story that won't make you cry and involves some magic. This is part of a longer story, that, sadly, involved a lot of tears and me doing my Nurse Ratched imitation, but this is, by far, the most interesting part.

This is not a fairy tale, although it begins like one.  Once upon a time, (January, actually) there was a woman who needed a cat.  Some people who loved her found her a little cat who had come to a shelter from a hoarding situation.  There were 28 cats in that house.  Some of the cats were sick and some were injured.  This cat, in fact, had suffered a punctured eye at some point and had scar tissue covering most of the eye.  And yet, with all of this, this was a sweet, loving little creature who could be held and petted and kissed.  She didn't have a name yet, was terrified to the point of paralysis and had just moved into her new home when the woman made a mistake.  She left the door open long enough for the sweet little cat to bolt out into the darkness of downtown Ithaca.

Here comes the story: 

We heard of her escape the next morning and dashed into town to begin searching. We split up at first, each doing separate "Here kitty, kitty, kitty's" and peering under anything big enough to hide a small, frightened cat. Often I would hear an answering meow and would try to track it, just to lose it in a morass of construction materials and plastic kid's stuff that had been left in a backyard.  I was wearing my pink "pussy" hat and Carolyn was wearing her "Rise Up Ithaca" hat, which might be the reason that one old guy was pretty nasty when we knocked on his door.  In the midst of crawling under porches I met a rather round tuxedo cat who was the source of the answering meows.  I would "Here kitty, kitty, kitty", and he would answer, "Yes?  You called?".  He began walking with us as we searched, chatting all the while.  As we were knocking on all of the doors in the neighborhood, asking for people to keep an eye out for her, we met the woman to whom the tuxedo cat belonged.  She told us that his name was Wilson.

We searched all of the garages that were open, put up signs and talked to many people who lived around that block.  Most of them were wonderful and one woman offered one of her own cats if we never found the one we had lost! I left my phone number with everyone.  And I chatted with Wilson.

We had been home an hour or two when I got a call that she had been sighted, so I dashed back to the neighborhood and searched with Jeremy, who had heard a distressed kitty cry right outside his house.  More searching, now with flashlights.  Wilson accompanied me for much of this.  Finally, I told him, "Look Wilson, I know that you can find her much better than we can. Please please please find her and bring her home.  The woman in that house, (and I pointed it out) "really needs this kitty home.  And the kitty needs to be there.  She's going to die out here in the cold.  Please Wilson, please bring her home."  I was sobbing by this time.

I left, feeling pretty discouraged.  

Moving into a hug with Carolyn

The next morning, the first thing I saw was a text.  It said that at midnight, our friend heard meowing at her front door, and when she  opened the door, in scooted her cat.  She said that a "big black cat" had cornered the cat on her front stoop.  WILSON to the rescue!  And when we got there to make sure that everything was okay, we leaned something new about this frightened, hiding cat.  

She hugs.  She puts those soft little white paws around your neck and moves in to snuggle.  And so, she got a name.  

Hugger.

I thanked Wilson for saving the day.  He asked me to leave food out on the stoop sometimes.  I said that it was a deal.

Whose Reality?

We--the dogs and I--are sitting in a lobby at the hospital, waiting for Carolyn to sign into the pain clinic.  Zuza is tucked in my jacket and Lukas has been sitting in the chair next to me. A man, accompanied by a nurse and a family member, was wheeled past. He was elderly and trembling and sat tall in the chair. The women were talking to him, obviously not getting the responses they were looking for.

"Well why don't you look at the cute little dog over there?" says Family Member.  They wheel him around, repeating the question, and come closer. He sweeps the room with his gaze, not slowing or registering anything. "Why would I look? How do I know what I'm seeing?", he asks.  
"Because they're so cute!", answers Family Member.
He shakes his head in disgust. "How do I distinguish what I'm really seeing?", he asks again.  I asked him if it would help if he touched them.  He shook his head and began to ask the same question again. the nurse said, "Your medication is wearing off, so you can--", he cut her off and started to ask again, obviously frustrated. They had turned to leave. The nurse came around to the front of his chair and crouched to be at eye level.  "I can't give you the answer that you're looking for.  I'm sorry".  She repeats this, and I feel that it is the most honest response he has gotten recently, and they move away, down the hall and around the corner.

It's like dipping momentarily into someone else's reality.  For Family Member, the dog's cuteness, like a kitten video, gives some solidity to the reality she is living, whether she likes it or not.  The Nurse seems to understand the Man's confusion, but can't sort it out for him, and my dogs and I are equally unable to penetrate his confusion.  I wonder what, and who he is seeing. I have dealt with three humans in the last two days who are completely untouched by my reality and the time sequences it follows.  I feel a little adrift, holding on to Zuza and Lukas like tiny life-jackets.  The Man used the word "distinguish".  He wasn't babbling gibberish; he had real concerns, real questions.  What was he seeing, and who?  And what does this say about my own reality?  The political landscape has become something similar to Alice's world seen through the Looking Glass.  Maybe that's where we are living now, on the other side of a Looking Glass, in a world unrecognizable.

And yet, I am anchored by my love for these innocents.

Tonight, hours later as I write this, my dogs have put themselves to bed without us.  Carolyn is sleeping in the chair after a hard Jubilee (chorus) rehearsal, and the Kittens are skulking like vultures, hoping that I will give them more food before Carolyn and I join the dogs,  (They know I will.  There is nothing better than being the cat who lives with an eating disordered female.)  Good Mama that I am, I will tuck us all into our respective beds, feed the fire, and do a last check of all of the doors before I succumb to the night.

I wish you all the sweet night of innocents, sleeping gently all around you.

Jesse's Last Chapter

My Jesse had her last day on earth January 13, 2017.  The new, young vet from Briar Patch--appropriately named "Kat"--came here with one of the techs, BJ, so we got to say good-bye right in the bedroom, right on the bed, where Jesse had stayed for the last couple of weeks. Carolyn didn't have to be the doctor, and I didn't have to be an assistant; we could just be the mommies saying goodbye to a presence that had been in our lives for as long as we were in each other's lives.  

As I write this, our youngest girl cat, Calleigh, is playing with one of her favorite toys in the world.  It's a needle cap from the needles that fit on my insulin pens.  There are probably 100 of them in this house, under the baseboard heaters, in the cellar, under the stairs, lurking under the refrigerator.  Life goes on, cat lives go on.

I believe that Jessa Jack Waddington McMaster goes on.  My sweet Jesse, indomitable spirit, happy and healthy and young and fearless, reaches out and finds hands that are always there to pet her. 

Silver Edged in Desperate Need

Jessa Jack Waddington 1997

This amazing kitten came to me in November 1997.  She was incredibly sick, so much so that I thought she was an amazingly calm kitten.  How wonderful, all sweetness and quiet.  And fevered.  And about to be euthanized as unadoptable.  This was the bad old days when kitties died more regularly at the Ithaca SPCA.  Her Mama had "died" and this little feral kitten was hanging by a thread.  And there I was, recently "divorced" from a 12 year relationship, headed into Heaven only knows what, with a spectacular woman--this is sincere, not sarcastic--who was allergic to cats.  And the kitten of my dreams appears, pewter gray, silver edged, in desperate need of rescue. 

Silver edged in desperate need.  Ah yes, that you were, my Jesse girl.  Ready to  teach me lessons that would take take two decades, two homes, two lovers to complete.  You were my ghost cat, the one no one knew existed except me and three other cats, Mama Kindra, Big Brother Path and your closest friend, your brother George.  Jesse was the last cat that was completely mine, adopted when I was struggling to feel complete in my own self, in my own house.  She taught me patience and delighted surprise when this sick kitten turned out to have a sense of loyalty, a sense of humor, and a sense of...self respect?  She  taught me to approach her at her own level, not as a tall, threatening presence, but as a creature on the floor, at the same level, reaching toward her--to have my hand guided by a sure paw, guided to her head, to her face, to the acceptance of a little cat who knew her worth to be priceless. The one time she escaped to the outside, I was able to bring her back in only because I used Kindra as a lure.  "Look Jesse, here kitty, kitty, kitty, kitty, look it's Kindra!"  I dangled Kindra in front of her, purring up a storm, because that was what my angelic Kindra did every day of her life, and Jesse followed her back into the house.  

And here I am, my heart silver edged in desperate need, watching this old lady cat purring at the end of her life. 

Jesse, at 18, in 2015

The Year Begins...

Jesse, in 2004 

Well, here we are, poised at the beginning of a new year. It's been an interesting week.  We got home from our great train adventure, going to Santa Fe via Amtrak--that's another story, with more pictures--on Thursday, December 29.  We were just bone tired and although we actually unpacked and started the laundry, we spent a lot of time just snuggling up with all of the cats.  The dogs were happy to be in a place where the floor doesn't move while they are trying to pee.

Okay, interrupting for some technical info.  This is, once again, being typed one-handed while I have my other arm wrapped around a cat.  Calleigh will tiptoe across the keyboard while simultaneously batting objects off the table so I tuck her in close and off the keyboard.  If I stop kissing her, or rubbing my face on her head, she looks at me and cries and pushes the laptop away with her back feet.  I guess that I just want to prove that I can still multitask.

Back to the story:  Jesse, our 19 year old matriarch, was upstairs in the bedroom where we had set up private accommodations around Thanksgiving.  She hadn't been eating well; she'd had a couple, scary, neurological-type episodes, so we brought her to the bedroom where her food could be out all day, she had a private litterbox nearby, she had her own bowl and a fountain for water, and she would have us at night.  It was really lovely. At night, we'd put away her food so that the dogs wouldn't get it, and she would come up on the bed without stepping on either dog and proceed to take possession of one of the human's pillows.  From this perfect position, she could wrap around the head of the human and reach down to grab a hand and place it in the right position to pet her.  She's been doing this since she was a baby, and it's the sweetest thing.  She was a very sick, nearly feral 3-month-old kitten when I adopted her.  She would only let me pet her if I laid on the floor and reached toward her.  Then she would stretch out a paw and guide my hand. 


                I took these pictures a month ago: 

Reaching.........

Right here......

Perfect

 She's been my baby for 19 years and has clearly preferred the mothering of Carolyn for the last 15 of those years.  In fact, she chose Carolyn before I did.  
And when I moved in with Carolyn, Jesse became a whole new cat.  She stopped hiding.  She sat on our laps in the living room.  She begged charmingly wherever we ate.  She was really happy.

When the kittens (the 1st set, from 2003) grew up and became obnoxious, Jesse moved into our bedroom for a couple of years.  When her 1st tormentor moved to the garage and the furnace room to flex his masculinity and a twisted sense of humor, she took over the house again.

Do you see in the pictures how her fur looks lined with silver?  She's always been the most beautiful thing; I called her my pewter cat, and that beautiful plush fur has stayed soft and thick and wonderful.  Now, her kidneys have begun to fail, in spite of the kidney diet she's been on, and she isn't interested in eating much of anything anymore.  She's not a cat who can be treated easily.  Giving pills is possible but very traumatic; trips to the office are accompanied with deep, loud howls and lots of stuff in the carrier that has to be cleaned up.  We've decided that we are going to simply give her the highest quality of life for as long as we can.

When we got home, we found that she wouldn't leave the closet.  She wasn't using the litterbox and we had to do some serious cleanup and rearranging.  She would eat if we hand-fed her and purred mightily when we would sit sit in there and pet her.  So, that's what we've been doing.
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The minute I finished writing this, we remembered that we had a jar of chicken baby food and took that to her. She got up and RAN to it. Sucked up the whole jar. Then, of course, I got dressed and dashed to Wegmans for more baby food. Carolyn spent hours luring her out of the closet with the food.  About the time she'd given up, Jesse arrived on the bed and walked right under the covers and curled up next to her. Next move? Carolyn sat next to her and petted her.  Hours later, during a pause in the petting, out came a paw, searching for a hand. She's still with us, 25 pounds of personality in a 7 pound cat.  

I thought that I was writing an obituary when I started this New Year's Day.  Nope.  Not yet.