It teases you with summer
Then torments you with winter.
Katley
Spring has been a long time coming. The month of March felt more like January and on the 31st of the month, winter let us know it wasn't ready to quit. There was sleet, freezing rain, and accidents on the road. The temperatures barely hit the freezing mark most days and there were even forecasts for snow. Fortunately, there was less than a coating for my region, however, friends in Washington, DC got 7" of snow on the first day of Spring!
April is when "real" spring as opposed to calendar spring arrives in New England, although snowstorms have doused the area with snow in early April. Back in 1997 we had the April Fool's Day Blizzard that brought 18" of snow. Everyone thought it was a joke until they woke up on April 1 with enough snow on the ground to put January to shame.
In Europe, on the other hand, my German friend Eric told me they hardly had a winter at all, and spring came early. I enviously looked at Facebook pictures of he and his wife strolling in the park without heavy winter coats.
With April also comes the dreaded filing date for income tax returns in the United States on April 15th. I find doing income taxes a tedious chore, but it saves me and my husband at least $150.00 to do it at home as opposed to using a tax preparer or a Certified Public Accountant. I also do the tax returns for my daughters. It sames them quite a bit of money. As a reward, they take me to a restaurant.
April also brings to mind my cat Fatso, who passed on three years ago. His obesity contributed to his demise, he died of congestive heart failure. His birthday was April 20, and he died two weeks before his thirteenth birthday.
Fatso, late winter 2011.
Fatso never liked the flash on the camera, so in most of his pictures, his eyes are closed, or almost closed.
Shortly after Fatso passed on, Fluffy, the next door neighbor's cat, decided to move in. Part of the reason was that the kids in one of the apartments next door constantly chased him and tried to dress him in doll clothes. Fluffy was primarily an outdoor cat and a serial killer as well; dead chipmunks sometimes littered the yard, and one time I caught him in the act of killing one. Aside from the bad habit of leaving dead chipmunks for me to dispose of (he never ate his kills), he was a very sweet and affectionate cat who liked to watch TV with my husband, and sometimes slept with me. He kept me warm after a freak October snowstorm in 2011 that knocked out electricity in many parts of New England. We had no heat for an entire week.
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Fluffy the Serial Killer, March 2012.
Fluffy was quite old when we got him, and he had wandering ways. He left the house one day during the summer of 2013 and never came back. Part of the reason had to do with the cat my daughter brought home after she graduated college the previous year. She and Fluffy didn't get along well and part of it had to do with the disparity in their ages. She was young and constantly bothered him with friendly attempts to play. It probably reminded him of the harassment he got from the kids next door.
Now that Kitten's grown, and her owner has her own home, I'm going to miss not having a cat around. What I'm not going to miss is cleaning the litter box, and chasing her all over the neighborhood when she escapes out the front door.
Kitten: "I didn't do it!"
One thing all these cats had in common was their affinity for Bulgarian folk music, especially the gaida (bagpipe). Critters seem to like music made from other dead animals. It's really weird. Fatso always joined me between 10 and 11 p.m. when the Bulgarian National Radio had its folk music broadcasts, and Kitten often nudged my laptop while I wrote and listened to music.
By the way, you can read something I posted on The Alien Diaries several years ago right after Fatso died.
You can also read the poem I wrote about my son's Jeep. It is the worst piece of automotive crap on the road, and absolutely refuses to die. The problem is that despite its problems, he has some weird attachment to it.
The poem is on page five of the Fine Flu Journal.
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