Tiberius on the lam:* Random Thoughts Part 2

I hate patterns. Everywhere. Give me solid colors, no prints. No muted patterns, no gradations of color. Just solid colors. In the house I am living in now, which is also the house I grew up in, there are patterns everywhere. My mother loved them. I do not.

The dogs love carpeting. I hate it, but wonder if our next house should have some carpeted rooms because they seem to love it.

I have been to three post offices in the area. I love the postal service. I love the different ways postal employees help people. I love the connection that the post makes to local communities. I think my regular post office will be the downtown Saginaw one on Water Street, but the women at the township one are lovely as well.

There is an old, brick Victorian on Court Street. For sale. A good size lot. Only $87,000. I think about what life would be if I bought it.

I don’t love that none of our mail has reached us using the Premium Forwarding Service. I like to imagine that there are really important letters out there in the ether waiting for me.

Twice a day, Vita comes up to sit on my shoulder and have me rub her. She purrs into my ear. If I try to stop petting her before she is ready, she hisses. When she is done, she walks away.

Tomorrow, December 9th, 2015, is the twentieth anniversary of my sister’s death. I never thought that I would be living again in the house we grew up in. I like to imagine small bits of her skin and hair still dwelling in the house. I never thought she would die. Sometimes, when I am sitting quietly downstairs, I can hear her teenaged voice in the bedroom upstairs. Sometimes, I think I see her. I never thought we would not be grown ups together. But here I am all grown, and she is gone.

When the beloved is out of town, Tiberius curls up right next to me, pressing his warm, strong body against my leg. Sometimes he dreams and thrashes about a bit, but he always returns to me, to nuzzle against my warm body. He does not know, and I will not tell him, that people want to see him killed.

*With a respectful and heartfelt nod to Barbara Neely’s extraordinary Blanche on the Lam. 

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