Word of the Day Challenge: Crypt

Photo A.M. Moscoso

My Grandmother used to feed and care for feral cats that lived across the street from us in the sugar cane fields in Hawaii.

She wasn’t sentimental by nature and she didn’t keep things like pets and she didn’t tape our artwork on her refrigerator door and she didn’t joke around.

So I always found it curious that she took care of these cats- cats that she didn’t name or cuddle or buy little toys for. Strangely, she did sew them blankets from scraps left over from her sewing projects. It wasn’t a slap dash project and the little cat quilts were actually well made.

She’d place the little blankets around her garden and when they got messy she’d throw them out and sew new ones.

One day I asked her about the Cane Field Cats  because the timing was right. When she was crocheting or when she was sewing or working on a project she was more talkative and lo and behold she was ready to chat.  ” because cats can see Spirits and if there are bad ones around they know. ”

I asked her what they did about these bad spirits and she said something along the vein that they met the same fate as the rodents in the fields.

” Really. ” I said.

She looked at me and she did not smile, or wink or offer any reassuring gestures after dropping it on me that our house could be sharing a road with a field of evil spirits.

” Really.” she told me.

” How come you don’t give them names? ” I asked.

She looked up at me. ” They aren’t the kind of cats that you give names too.”

” How come. ”

And then she said something that gave me a little chill. ” Because they have names already. ”

I had another question and I knew it was an important one.

” So. They are cats. Right? Just ordinary cats. ”

My Grandmother said, ” How come you ask questions you already know the answer too. That’s a waste of time and nobody lives forever. Go turn up the tv. ”

” Okay, ”

” And  then go feed the cats.”

Below are a collection of pictures of cemetery cats. I think a few are staged but the candid shots are the important ones to pay attention to because, when I saw them I didn’t see Cemetery Cats, I saw Cane Field Cats and given where these cats live I would have to say they are very, very well fed.

Photographer Unknown

Photographer Unknown

Photographer Unknown

Photographer Unknown

Photographer Unknown