Quiet house

Pete, our 12-year-old mixed Wheaton terrier, loves the new wood floors that emphasize the clip-clopping of his nails.


Gus, our 16-year-old cat, has mellowed with age.

Friday: Paul went for his twice-per-year overnight at pal Anthony's house. Liberto is at work, of course, and the animals are taking naps. I dreamed a lot about animals last night. First I dreamed about our golden retriever, Sandy, who died on the day we moved into this house, July 4, 1994. It was one of those euphoric-feeling, velvety dreams, in which I could fully feel her warm red coat and smell her sweet doggy scent. I was filled with joy at seeing her again. My other dreams were about cats. One of them involved a pussywillow-gray cat lurking around the fish pond looking too interested in the koi, so I ran over and pulled it away. Our real cat, Gus, has outgrown any interest in hunting. When he was a young hunter, he used to deposit a range of interesting deceased offerings at the front door---squirrels, birds, frogs, anything that moved. They say cats leave their prey at the door as gifts to their owners. Those youthful days have passed. Now 16, a senior citizen in cat years, he sits on one of the lounge chairs beside the pond and stares disinterestedly and yawns at the birds who descend into the yard and the koi who glide back and forth across the pond.

In today's mail I received an official document accepting my resignation from Chatham County, effective July 9th, the date on my letter of resignation. July 9th? For a nano-second, my worrywart tendencies surged. Although I know that Chatham County divides the annual salary into 13 segments in order to accomodate summer pay through the year, I thought about how inconvenient it would be to have a gap in my paychecks between jobs. However, a quick call to Benefits Dept. ensured me that I'll be paid through Aug. 29th (same day I should get my first paycheck from Bryan Co.)and continue to have health and life insurance benefits through that time. Meanwhile, I'll sign up for my new benefits next week at the Orientation.

On another note, this morning I was standing in line at the convenience store buying my lottery ticket. A woman ahead of me was buying two or three cartons of cigarettes. I don't know how much cigs cost these days, but when I heard the total: 92.00 and some change, I wondered if she had bought gas too, or whether cartons of cigarettes are just wildly expensive. I'm so out of touch with smoking that I had to research the cost on the internet, which says that a carton of cigs is anywhere from $15 to $20. So maybe the woman was buying gas too. But still, I kept wondering...how in the XF%^(@! do people afford to smoke, at $3.75 a pack or $15 a carton? Especially lower income people? A few pack a day habit must be really expensive. I quit smoking for the last time in 1980, in the days before Nicorette or patches. It was hell, but somehow I broke the habit, and every day I thank the Heavens that I did. I'm sure part of the reason I started smoking in the first place was because I grew up in an era when it was cool and sophisticated, not nasty, and I grew up with a mother who smoked. Not once did my parents ever say, "Don't ever smoke!" the way I did with my sons. The truth about the dangers of smoking emerged in the '60's but didn't really take hold until a decade later, so my parents had no reason to warn me against it, especially since my mother was a smoker until her death. My father's next wife was also a heavy smoker, and she died of lung cancer in 1987. Aside from the health dangers, which is no small issue, I would hate being a smoker today for the economic impact it would have. An extra $200 or $300 a month for that addiction would be a nuisance!