When my lovely Big Feet died

May Observation

May is the Most Marvellous of Months in The Garden
May is the Most Marvellous of Months to have a Writing Moment
A warm May evening is delectable.

When the cuckoo vocalises its name from minor to major third, 
sometimes to a fourth 

or an interval in-between

that is why it’s sometimes hard for me to echo.

When the nightingale plays an operatic role 

it doesn’t need a chorus.  

He is singing now, waiting for a friend to cease his solitude.

My cat likes to be stroked in hot evening sunshine 

as she lies on the table. 

I forgive her as she stretches out in pure pleasure.
Naughty cat!

She frowns when she hears the neighbour say ‘Stop’ 

to presumably the dog 

as there was no reply.   

Big Feet’s fur is so incredibly hot as it absorbs the sun. 

Her head is cool 

but as I run my hand along her back 

it becomes hotter midway along her spine 

hottest three-quarters of the way, almost too hot to touch, 

then her tail is quite cool.  
How a cat responds to sunshine is quite phenomenal. 

How can she cope with such heat as she lies on the oiled skin / plastic tablecloth?

She loves it when I stroke and scrunch a right ear with my left hand.

This time she stretches closer to my pen, 
reaching out to touch lightly with both paws 

as an acknowledgement 

that I am writing about her.
A narcissistic cat!

Now she has turned so that her cooler tummy faces the sun.   

She has always been called a French tart, a French tottie.

She is very much at home in my garden.   

I stroke under her chin and along the jawline.  

She caught a field mouse this morning.

My loud voice told her to go ‘OUT’ of the house.  

It’s really warm 

so I remove layers of my own clothing 

and expose my skin towards the golden ball 

to enjoy the heat of sun for the first time in the year.   

It’s after six p.m.

It's the second week of May.

Cat and Mouse

Big Feet likes to play with her Christmas gift.. a pink, felt mouse!

Killer Cat

The lovely Big Feet, now aged at least 13, recently, ostensibly treated for arthritis by the vet, although I suspected a pulled muscle, has shown improved action in the field, so to speak!  I don't know why but she has become more grumpy, more vocal, insisting she goes out or insisting she stays in.  She cries in a way that she didn't in her previous home (not that I was aware of), for food, or to be let out or to be let in!  She likes people. She likes company. She is a talkative cat. She likes affection. She gets affection. We talk to each other.
BUT... RECENTLY...she has returned to her younger youthfulness and become KILLER CAT!
This cat used to be a moler if she could be bothered! She used to trot across a busy road to the pedestrian pavement of the bridge, cross the road again and go to the English Common by the riverside, return the same way with a large, LARGE, rabbit or baby rabbit and proceed to be proud of her display!  Or go in the other direction to a garden to remove moles. The owner was very happy!
RECENTLY, the mouse population outside this house has been decimated by at least one a day. Not shrews, but mice, and I am convinced that at least one was a harvest mouse, so I was upset.
Cats kill and I know that!  BUT THIS CAT IS GAINING WEIGHT!!
I was distraught when I heard what I cheerfully thought were baby birds squabbling in the courtyard but to my dismay it was BIG FEET in Le Grand Salon batting an 'Eurasian Blue-tit' fighting for its life.  Poor wee thing!  Knowing that it had little chance of survival it was taken outside, set on the rockery to draw breath, but to no avail!
I am searching my conscience as to why I am upset when she kills a swallow, or a harvest mouse, or a blue-tit, or bat but am not emotionally straught, yes I mean this word, when it is a shrew... although I have rescued those in my time and been bitten in the process!
Imagine what it would be like if a HUGE GIANT CAME AND ATTACKED US... if a dino-saw-us!
I would faint! I would be DEAD!
 with thanks to Wikipedia photo usage!

Cats sleep anywhere

Big Feet the cat has taken a variety of new places to sleep in the shade or in the sunshine!
Cats sleep anywhere! They are remarkably perceptive! They change their habits on a whim and according to the weather.  She manages to 'move on', to cope with the first stages of arthritis.

Cats sleep anywhere, any table, any chair.
Top of piano, window-ledge, in the middle, on the edge.
Open draw, empty shoe, anybody's lap will do.
Fitted in a cardboard box, in the cupboard with your frocks.
Anywhere! They don't care! 
Cats sleep anywhere.
Eleanor Farjeon (1881 - 1965)

My Cat

 

is such a naughty one!  This morning from a high vantage point on logs, she nonchalantly watches a wood-pigeon pecking crumbs in my courtyard, possibly from yesterday's last Workawayer alfresco luncheon which was mighty fine using the last of the never-ending cous-cous!

Me thinks ah.... pigeon pie! ***

A week ago, as reported earlier, she caught and killed a swallow!
Now, every creature has its place but ...

I'm training the cat to live outside at night in the atelier where she has cat-flap entrance! His Lordship has left and Madame insists!  I love our cat/his cat/my cat but she can be a nuisance and if I don't put cushions around the end of my settee where she and her sister used to scratch,  AND I catch her in the act, then I have to create a loud shouty 'NO' and I don't like doing that for mine own ears to hear!  It's the one place they scratched... and Big Feet has remembered all this time!

*** When I was nineteen I lived in board and lodgings in Winchester ... a rented room, with meals shared in the owner's kitchen.  She was French, bereaved, with a ten year old son. There were two other French student girls paying rent. One day, a pigeon appeared in the courtyard.  It was fed with grain ... this continued for several days! One day, the broom swathed through the air and French Madame waved her trophy in the air. I was horrified at the slaughter. Even more horrified that night or next day when Pigeon Pie was presented for the evening meal!  Being of a squeamish disposition in those delicate days, knowing nothing about people or life other than my narrow towny-eyed vision, I was keen to return to London at the end of the academic year!