Month: May 2021

Happy Caturday!

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Today I want to celebrate Black Cats.

So, let’s celebrate these wonderfully lovable and spooky felines- starting with mine and then let’s move on to some great artwork by  Théophile Alexandre Steinlen and quotes from the Black Cat by Edgar Allen Poe.

Blitzer In A Tree
Photo A.M. Moscoso

“This latter was a remarkably large and beautiful animal, entirely black, and sagacious to an astonishing degree.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, The Black Cat

THÉOPHILE STEINLEN, 1900
” Cat In The Moonlight “

“The fury of a demon instantly possessed me. I knew myself no longer. My original soul seemed, at once, to take its flight from my body; and a more than fiendish malevolence, gin-nurtured, thrilled every fibre of my frame.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, The Black Cat

Théophile Alexandre Steinlen

“With my aversion to this cat, however, its partiality for myself seemed to increase.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, The Black Cat

Théophile Alexandre Steinlen

 

Flashback Friday to Nothing But The Night

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For Fandango’s Flashback Friday

Nothing But The Night

First Published

October 12, 2007

at The Soul Food Cafe

THÉOPHILE STEINLEN, 1900
” Cat In The Moonlight “

It was only five doors down to her own house; a three minute walk on a well lit street on a quiet cold night last October.

But that didn’t matter because Damiana Dergmuse knew she was in trouble the minute that door shut behind her and she heard the tumblers in the lock grind together.

With that sound that half block turned into miles and she was going to have to walk it all alone.

” There’s nothing to be afraid of, ” she told herself out loud. ” There’s nothing out here now that isn’t out here when the lights are on. “

Then she took a deep breath and it froze in her chest and she was about to run back into the house she had just come out of because that rah-rah speech she had just given herself wasn’t going to work.

In fact she was about to have a nervous breakdown right there on the street and how would that look?

It was settled she was turning back.

Before she turned around she told herself one more time…she could do this.

It was only five doors down and she’d be there in seconds, minutes if she could just put one foot in front of the other and move.

Then each of those steps would add up until she would be through her own front door and she would find herself in the safety of her own room and the cinnamon smell that always filled her house during the winter months.

Wouldn’t that be better then sitting in front of a neighbor’s fireplace, in a neighbor’s chair, petting a neighbor’s cat in a neighbor’s house?

Of course it would be better to be in her own home so Damiana started to walk and as she passed the first house she heard a thump, thump and then a drag and a hiss and she realized that was the sound of her own heart stopping and starting in her own chest.

” Stupid woman ” she told herself.

She put her hand to her heart and felt to make sure that it was still beating and when she felt it pound against her hand she started to walk again.

And almost hidden under the sounds of her own foot steps and rapid breathing she heard something sliding across the pavement behind her.

What she heard was a dragging sound, metal against concrete and as much as she wanted to stop and turn around to find out what could be making such an awful sound she couldn’t because now she was three doors down from her own home and in the horizon she could see a thin line of orange in the skyline.

Damiana was sure of one thing, that’s not the last thing she wanted to see on this Earth, so she walked a little faster and as she did the sky filled with crows, hundreds of them and they were flying east.

The sun was coming up, and the thin line in the horizon got a little wider and Damiana could hardly breath and behind her the dragging sound got a little louder and a little heavier and she was determined that sound wouldn’t be the last thing she would hear in this life so she picked up her feet and ran.

The scraping sound got louder and she heard a whoosh and she flew up her stairs and to her door and she pushed it open and without turning around slammed it behind herself.

It was morning and the sun was coming through the windows and outside she could hear birds singing and with that sound ringing in her ears she ran faster up the stairs to the top floor of her house.

” Made it!” she cried with relief, ” I’ve made it!”

Then she laid down on her bed and she said as slammed the coffin lid shut over her head, ” There’s nothing out there to for anybody to really be afraid of…not now anyway.”

Mrs Lee and the Birth of Pig Girl

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Word of the Day Challenge: Gorgeous

Paul Klee

Mrs. Lee was my second grade teacher- and it’s a good thing she was a teacher back in the early 1970’s because now days Mrs. Lee would have found herself at the receiving end of a lawsuit or two.

She had anger issues. Plus she was quick to dole out pinches and hair pulling to her less then favored students.

Guess which one I was?

One day I was talking in class ( because I was 7 and kids that little are a little squirrely ) and everyone was talking and ignoring Mrs Lee when she told us to shut up.

Frustrated out of her mind,  she stormed from the back of the class and head up our chattering row of unruly students and she stopped at my desk.  I heard her yell again and then she grabbed a handful of hair from the back of my head and banged my face into my desk.

That did the trick.

You could have heard a penny drop for the rest of the day.

When I got home my Mom asked me what happened at school because the front of my shirt was covered with blood  and my lips were a little swollen and I said, ” I fell off of the monkey bars ”

HA! I thought. No way was I going to tell my Mom I got into trouble for talking in class. Getting busted once a day was enough for me.

 

Not to long after the face plant incident, we had art day and our project was to draw the person sitting next to us.

The boy sitting next to me looked at me and then he put his face over his paper and he dug in. He was like a little drawing machine. He grabbed crayon after crayon and filled in every square inch of paper.

When he was done he held it up and to my horror he had made me look like a pig. He had drawn big round circles for breasts  and a  huge smiling pink half moon circle extending from between my legs. I’m not kidding you. I was horrified. ” Look Anita! I drew you like a pig! You have a dick and boobs! And look you’re peeing too!”

I started to cry. It was an awful dirty picture and he had even written my name under the pig.

Mrs. Lee flew across the room and wanted to know why I was making so much noise and I pointed at Raymond’s picture. ” He made me into a pig! ” I couldn’t point out the body parts or the pee. It was to embarrassing.

She looked at it and said. ” Oh. It does not look like a pig. It’s a nice drawing. The colors are gorgeous and look at that nice smile! Where’s your picture Anita? Can you draw something as nice as that?”

No. No. I didn’t. I spent the rest of the day with my head down on my folded arms and I stayed that way until the bell rang.

It was a long time after Mrs. Lee hung that picture up on the art wall  that I didn’t see that pig’s face looking back at me from the mirror.

I suppose sometimes I still do see it.

 

 

 

 

Jump To It or Else

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Putting My Feet In The Dirt Prompt#5-Quick Casseroles and Inky Obstacles

” The Guardian Mind “
Artist: Artificial Intelligence

I jump out of bed when the alarm

rings

that is how I start my day

that is my first jump

 

I jump into my car and

and drive to the train station

and when I get there I jump out of my car

and tap my pass and 10 minutes later I jump on the train.

 

When the homeless people scream at me that I am in their way and why don’t I show

some respect I jump out of their way- respectfully and I always jump out of the way

of the Metro Bus barreling through the crosswalk against their light because that is the

way  they roll baby. Jumpity jump jump jump.

 

When someone asks me a question

or my phone rings – it’s jump jump jump

By then I have lost track of how many jumps that makes

I should write it down, but I’m not sure I can count that high because…

 

I have only been awake for a couple of hours and I’m not exactly at 100% yet.