String Ends and New Socks in an Old House

New Year's Eve

2007 ended in an unconventional and portentous way. First thing Monday, the cat was nowhere to be found. After her pink-eye episode of Saturday, I was worried. What if it were more than pink-eye after all? I searched off and on for about 2 hours. No cat. As I stepped out of the shower, my daughter shouted, "Mama, mama, come quick! Shadow has a string stuck to her bottom!"

I hope you're not eating while reading this. If you are, come back later when you're finished.

After toweling off and dressing, I opened the bathroom door and saw the cat scamper first one way and then another, a glimpse of red trailing her. Oh, brother. She really did have yarn stuck to her bottom. I stopped her and reached down to pull off the yarn.

Here was the problem. I couldn't pull off the yarn. The foot long stretch of red yarn wasn't stuck to her. It was exiting her.

I called my daughter to get a tissue, which she did. She then wisely stood back a good 5 feet in a mixture of horror, curiosity, and humor. I held poor Shadow and assisted her with the emission of the remaining foot of red yarn. Neither of us ever planned such an intimately gross experience, and hopefully, Shadow, having ended the year with the kittenish foolishness of slurping yarn will lead us all into a far wiser and intelligent 2008.

So, how is this portentous? In our house, it seems the best day to do something incredibly un-smart is New Year's Eve Day. Go out with a bang. The idea is that anything that goes wrong on New Year's Eve Day accentuates the brilliance of going forward. "We got that out of our system. We got that behind us. Next year has to be better." (No, the puns weren't originally intended, but they work really well.)

New Year's Day 2008

Lying in bed early New Year's Day I realized that I have lived in our house longer than I have lived in any other living space in my entire life. I have now lived in Washington State longer than all the other 6 I've lived in, except Mississippi. This revelation has set off a domino chain of thoughts to be followed, prodded, and explored. It also seems portentous for the year.

One thread of thought reads: how is it the nomadic child grew up to stay in one place? How do I stay in one place longer? Can I stay in one place? Did this realization bring on the wanderlust or was it already there? Where do I want to go? Do I want to go? Can I go and stay at the same time?

I think I need to write more, to open up that treasure chest of stories lying in a drawer, in journals, in notebooks, and in the back of my mind. Perhaps that is travel of the going and staying kind. Perhaps it is the tip of an iceberg that floats me away physically and mentally and brings me home.