If I Were The Wind

Yes, it's true, I am a cat person. It probably seems like a cop-out to blog about my cats because I could literally talk about them forever. And maybe it is a cop-out, especially because I don't yet know what my point is in talking about them, or really what I want to say. I guess I'll start at the beginning, when I was a baby, and cats first fell in love with me.

I have a picture of myself when I was less than a year old, holding myself in a standing position to look out of the window, and our old cat Sammy doing the exact same thing next to me. Apparently Sammy loved me from the moment I came home from the hospital; he like to sleep in my crib with me, follow me around the house, groom me, etc. Perhaps this is the root of why cat's comfort me, make me feel happy, whole and safe. I don't think that I could ever live in a home without cats, they are just the greatest joy.

Growing up, we had such a huge variety of cats and experiences with cats. We served as kind of a stray cat sanctuary; every stray cat for miles always seemed to end up on our porch. I couldn't even begin to count the amount of cats that we took in, looked after and eventually found good homes for. Some of the cats that found us were wild, feral cats, and it would take sometimes over a year to win a cats trust and be able to do something so simple as pet it. Shadow was like that. He started coming around when I was 8 or 9, and I remember that I was 10 years old the first time that Shadow let me pet him. He lived outside of our house, under the neighbors porch, for a year as we fed him, kept him healthy, talked to him, and tried to let him know that he could trust us, before he finally came into our home to stay. Eventually Shadow came to be himself around us, and he was an incredibly intelligent, loyal and loving cat. He died about 5 years ago of old age.

Besides all of the normal stray cats that wondered into our yard, we also took in the countless cats that our crazy neighbors (the people that lived directly behind us) abandoned. They have a terrible habit of getting a female kitten every year, never spading her, and by mid-summer there is a slew of kittens running around. These people are the type who seem to breed as quickly as cats do, and are not nice to either their children or their cats. All summer long all we hear is a long list of obscenities being screamed at each other, the children (or grandchildren) and the cats. It is no wonder that almost every single cat they've ever had has taken up residence at our house, and they have hardly even noticed the disappearances. Animals are like cute, fuzzy objects to them, not living breathing creatures that deserve love, food and a home. People like that make me sick and ashamed to be a human. What makes it worse is that I know how absolutely wonderful the cats that they abuse are, I've known many of them deeply. I should almost be thankful for the way that they treat animals because it's given me some of the best experiences of my life.

Izzy and Precious (names given by the awful neighbors) are two of the most important figures of my life. Precious was Izzy's daughter, and both of them ended up as part of our family. Precious was my darling, she slept with me, listened to me, played with me and we adored each other. Precious was always a little off, though. She seemed to slowly slip into a paranoid insanity, and eventually became so scared of everything that she would not leave the basement. It turns out that pain was partly to blame, she had a slipped disk somehow, but even strong pain medication couldn't bring her out of her paranoid stupor. It's times like these when a person, or a family, has to think about what's more important: being alive or being at peace. Peace generally seems like the best answer, and we all agreed that it was time to get Precious put to sleep. I can't say that it wasn't difficult, but it was the right thing to do. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that Precious, as well as the other cat's of whom that difficult decision had to be made for, was grateful to us for letting her go.

After Precious, Izzy and I became close. It wasn't in the same way that Precious and I were, but we had a bond, and still do, although she died about 5 years ago. Now, this is the part that I'm nervous to write about, because I don't want to make myself look crazy, but I am a firm believer of reincarnation and that when we pass we are not gone, and we don't necessarily need to leave those that we love behind right away. I suppose my belief in this wouldn't be so strong if I'd never had cat's, especially Izzy. Eventually Izzy got old, developed cancer and we had to let her go. Not long after she died I had a dream about her and I know that she was there, I know that she was with me. I can't explain how I know, it's just a feeling, like knowing somebody has stepped into a room with you, though none of your normal senses picked up on it. The same thing happened to me not long after my grandma died. I dreamed that I was in her apartment, I walked into her room and she was there. In my dream it freaked me out and I woke up instantly, unable to shake the feeling that she had truly been there. I know that if it had been a normal dream than it would not have scared me, why would I be shaken up by a dream about my grandma? At any rate, I can't help but feel that Izzy, although not a ghost, has been watching over me for the past few years. Twice since that first dream with her, I've had moments of being incredibly upset, stressed out and in need of comfort. This is when Izzy has visited me in my dreams. The last time that it happened was three years ago, I was going through a rough time, and it wasn't only Izzy that came to me, Otto, another deceased cat of mine, was with her.

Mine haven't been the only experiences that my family has had with deceased cats. Another cat that entered our lives through the front porch and who left our lives far to quickly, was Sabrina. She was another cat abused and abandoned by our neighbors. After she died and we told them about it, they didn't even remember who she was. But Sabrina was wonderful, she was a beautiful, petite, long haired, black cat. She was also fierce, and enjoyed hunting down and killing squirrels for fun, and though my mom is generally irked by that sort of thing, she fell in love with Sabrina. I suppose we all did. She was so cute, yet intelligent and strong. No one could mess with Sabrina, and none of the other cats ever tried. For that brief year that she was with us, she was reigning queen of the house. But one day she got sick, and our hearts were broken when we found out that she had leukemia. For nine days she continued to get sicker and sicker, no matter what medicine we gave her, until in a moment of utter disbelief that it had happened so fast, my mom had to rush Sabrina to the vet to get her put to sleep. That night after she died, my parents had a bizarre experience. Shadow, who was still alive at this point and usually slept on their bed, would not enter my parents room. Sometime late in the night my dad awoke to find Sabrina sitting on his chest. In this half awake, half asleep moment, he pet Sabrina and then went back to sleep. A short time later my mom awoke in a panic, convinced that there was a strange cat in their bed. After both of my parents woke up completely, they realized that Sabrina had come back to say goodbye. After that night we never saw Sabrina again.

It's experiences like these, and countless others, that confirm in me a belief that animals feel as much as people do, and how we treat animals is important. I also intimately understand that death is a part of life, and it's selfish to hold on to someone who is suffering and not let them pass into the next stage of their existence. I know that if I had not grown up seeing the ways in which animals live and die, death would be a much scarier concept to me. But death is part of life, and letting go can be hard, but its something that everyone has to do.

Posted by Jennifer Murray at 11:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, when I arrived on campus today, it was 60 degrees out and sunny. I biked to class in springtime glory, soaking in the warmth and trying to hide my face upon remembering that I forgot to put sunscreen on. It was wonderful. I even wore leggings and a skirt, and wasn't cold at all. Feeling the warm air, listening to the birds chirp, watching children play outside and mothers walking their babies in strollers... all of it made me forget how quickly things can change.

I was in Shakespeare class, not so much bored but still hopelessly trying not to nod off (I think it's more the time of day and not so much the content or the drone of my professors voice that makes this a regular occurrence) when I noticed the weather changing. It seemed as though a dark cloud was moving in, "could it be rain?" I wondered. I hoped that it wasn't, I had on a silk skirt that I don't like getting wet, and who likes biking home in the rain anyhow? Class ended and it only seemed to be getting darker, and by the time I got outside it was sprinkling. Looking around I noticed that there was definite blue sky beyond the rain cloud, and I thought I might be able to get home without getting too wet. So off I went.

Not far off of campus, I happened to look towards downtown and saw the prettiest puffs of dark cloud with wafts of rain trailing down like delicate spiderplants formed out of stardust. The trail of rain seemed to fit in so well with the tall buildings of downtown, continuing the pillar of gray color where the buildings reach their height and the rain begins. The sight of rain moving in from the distance is one of my favorite sights, even when it occurs at the most inconvenient moments. It reminded of when I was a child, and my dad and I were out fishing on a lake up north. We were visiting a family members cabin and because it was a beautiful day, we took out that persons small boat with an old motor. We were pretty far out in the lake when we noticed the weather begin to change, and over a line of trees behind us, a line of black clouds with sheets of dark rain became visible. because I wanted to feel grown up or something, I was steering the boat, which was controlled by a handle coming off of the motor at the back of the boat. When we saw the rain, I quickly turned the boat around to head home. The only problem was that I turned the motor to quick, and the handle attached broke off just as the boat began to turn, and we were suddenly spinning around in circles. Whilst spinning, my dad and I had to switch spots so that he could control the motor, and then we started for home, a little shaken and very dizzy. We arrived back to shore in the knick of time, and got into the cabin just in time to see the wave of rain come upon us. It's a humbling experience to see the fury of nature come upon you like an opposing army.

So as I was biking home today, I thought that I was in the clear, and was going to make it home with out getting too wet. That was when it started to hail on me. It was only small hail, pieces of ice surrounded by snow being thrown on me like on me like trick snowballs in a snowball fight. It wasn't too bad until the rain got heavier and I was quickly very soaked with water. I wasn't really too upset, It was kind of fun to be out in the first real rain of the year. The one crack of thunder I heard made me feel all the more heroic. The only thing that was not fun was the wind blowing against me, making ever pedal feel like my hardest gear. It reminded me of a storm that we had late last summer. The storm I'm thinking of was a real storm, where everything is suddenly eerily still, and then a rolling black cloud moves in with fierce wind and crackling thunder. Thankfully my evening class was canceled that day, and I just sat in my room watching the storm move in. Suddenly though, I remembered that my roommate Clara had class, and I quickly darted out of my room to offer her a ride to campus. But she was already gone. "Why would she leave knowing the fury that was about to be poured down on us?" I asked her boyfriend. He just shrugged his shoulders in a typical way. When Clara came home hours later, I demanded and answer to my question. She said that she knew what she was getting into, and wanted to know what it would be like, despite the danger. Apparently it wasn't too bad, the hail didn't hurt and the wind didn't knock her down, but there was a massive puddle flowing out from where she sat in class, which was a little embarrassing. My experience today was nothing like that.

By the time I arrived home today, it was once again sunny and calm, no more rain or wind. The birds were chirping and my cats were waiting eagerly for my return so that they could go outside and enjoy the sun. My clothes are now drying as I sit and type, and I'm feeling very happy that it is finally spring.

Posted by Jennifer Murray at 10:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

One of my neighbors once told that in America, MN rates really high as one of the healthiest states. I think that that's probably true, we're not as industrial as other places, though we do have problems with agricultural pollution... but that's not what I"m talking about here. I like MN, I feel pretty good breathing the air and drinking the water here. The exact opposite was true in New Orleans. One of the first things I remember being told when I moved into the dorm was, buy bottled water. Nobody trusts the tap water in New Orleans. I don't know if this is really a valid fear, because I do know that in the US, tap water standards are more stringent than bottled water, but who knows. I guess one thing you learn when studying environmental problems is that lot's of private and even public entities don't follow safety guidelines, and often pollution limits are not as high as they should be to prevent all possible side effects. Anyways, I still drank the tap water in New Orleans because I think buying bottled water is stupid and wasteful. Besides, water was the least of my environmental worries there.

I didn't realize how bad the air pollution situation was at first, but I slowly came upon the facts. I remember being out in the quarter one day, hanging out with my painter friend Jaime and looking at the paintings of another artist set up next to Jaime. I don't remember this womans name, or what most of her art looked like, but I do remember one particular piece. There was a kind of gross green throughout the painting, with an oil refinery scene in the background. In the foreground was a kind of sickly crazy looking person, and a flower. She said this is was a painting of her hometown in, not far from New Orleans.

In an environmental policy class that I took there at UNO, I remembering learning much more about this are of Louisiana aptly referred to as "cancer alley," which is where I'm sure that the street artist was from. "Cancer alley" is a string of poor small towns, inhabited mainly by black Americans, surrounded by oil refineries, where cases of cancer, childhood lung disease (asthma, etc), and general poor mental and physical health is ridiculously high. The people that live there are too poor to move, and nobody with any power cares about them. This is the case with many small towns in the rural Louisiana, big companies move in on small towns, destroy their environment and human health, without any compensation. I remember watching a video about a town where some company started dumping some sort of industrial waste into a pond, which eventually ended destroying the livelihood and health of most people in the town. Yet, almost nothing was done to stop the dumping or help the people. This country can be a disgusting and vile place.

At any rate, besides the environmental discrimination of poor people in rural Louisiana, the city of New Orleans has its own pretty big pollution problems. For one thing, there are a great number of oil refineries that surround the city, and if any one of them were to blow, the city would be uninhabitable for a while. Going about my daily business, I would often wonder what the likelihood of such an event was, and I figured pretty high because of how corrupt oil companies seem to be, and maybe don't follow the strictest safety measures. I don't know. But being surrounded by industry, New Orleans has really really bad air quality. I knew this when I lived there, but I don't think that the gravity of the situation struck me until I left New Orleans, came home, and discovered that I had somehow developed asthma.

I never had breathing problems as a child, so when I came back to MN and started to wheeze every time I rode my bike, I thought it was weird, but I didn't think it was anything serious. After a year of not being able to breath by the time I got to class everyday, I decided to go to the doctor, and finally (yet stupidly because I should have known) learned that I have asthma. Where did it come from? Hmmm, I wonder.

So, New Orleans gave me asthma, and that sucks. I hate having to use an inhaler every time I bike, or walk rapidly, or laugh too much. But asthma is not the only problem that New Orleans air gave me. When I visited New Orleans in the summer of 2005, I developed a tonsil infection. It was weird, I wasn't sick, I just had swollen and infected tonsils. Also, when I lived in New Orleans, that spring I developed a terrible sinus infection, I think partly due to pollution and partly because of all of the natural allergens that my body wasn't use to. New Orleans air is yucky. It's humidity is full of industrial pollution, mold, plant spores, Cajun spices, etc. Apparently my lungs just can't handle New Orleans, which is sad because I love it there.

Posted by Jennifer Murray at 05:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)