Sunday, February 10, 2013

Sunday, February 10, 2013

Tonight's picture was taken in February of 2009. I kept a supply of cupcakes in a Tupperware in our room. I baked them at home between hospital stays and then packed them up to go to Mattie's PICU room. The reason why two dozen cupcakes were needed was I used them as incentives to get Mattie to do his physical therapy! In this particular picture you can see Mattie with Anna, his physical therapist. That day happened to be Anna's birthday and when Mattie found out, he wanted her to have one of his special cupcakes. So I snapped a picture of this dynamic duo together. Anna no longer lives in our geographical area, but she was one of Mattie's care team members would I absolutely loved. Not only was she extremely competent, but she was compassionate, could think outside the box, and was always honest with me. She deserved this cupcake and much more.


Quote of the day: The truth that many people never understand, until it is too late, is that the more you try to avoid suffering the more you suffer because smaller and more insignificant things begin to torture you in proportion to your fear of being hurt. ~ Thomas Merton

Though Patches was born in January of 1996, Peter and I consider today her official birthday. Because on this day she came into our lives. Patches is 17 years old today! HAPPY BIRTHDAY NURSE PATCHES. Patches was an abandoned cat on the streets of DC. We assume that someone did own her prior to us because at a young age she knew how to use a litter box and also LOVED the sound of a can opener. Patches managed her way into our commons area of our complex and was screaming her head off for two days outside. She was desperate for attention and a home! Apparently I was the only person on our floor bothered by her incessant meowing. So I put out a cardboard box outside for her to sleep in and some food. At that point I wasn't sure if she was someone's cat or abandoned. On February 10th she got more brazen and jumped on our kitchen windowsill. When I saw her that night staring me in the face while I was washing dinner dishes, she got to me. I had Peter go outside and offer her some steak. Patches was scared and ran away from Peter. So Peter decided to go downstairs to get our mail. When he came back up, Patches charged at Peter. He wasn't sure what she was going to do to him, but she charged at him in order to rub against him and get petted. The bond between Peter and Patches STARTED on February 10th and has grown ever since. That night, we brought Patches into our home but locked her in the bathroom. I wasn't sure if she had an illness or what, and I wanted her checked out by a vet. The next day we took her to the vet and who found a whole host of problems with her. Keep in mind Patches was walking around with a BB bullet in her left! The bullet remains in her leg even today, because it was deemed safer not to operate on her. Patches was a very sick girl who we had to nurse back to health at such a young age. Our complex at the time did not allow cats in the units. I tried to find someone to adopt Patches but it was impossible. So it came down to taking her in (mind you I am allergic to cats!) or most likely going to an animal shelter. There was no way I was letting that happen to such a sick cat, so despite our leasing agreement, we adopted Patches. Now of course most of our neighbors have cats! If you ask Peter when Patches became our cat, he would most likely say that she became our cat before February 10th, because as soon as I saw her walking around our commons area, I named her Patches. I named her for her colorful calico coat! Somehow she was destined to be with us.

We spent most of the day getting ready to depart for California on Wednesday. By mid-day Peter encouraged me to get washed and dressed. We went for a long walk and by the time we came home we were both frozen. Nonetheless, I went back outside to clean our deck. When I am inspired, I have to follow the energy. There were so many leaves and bird seed shells to contend with, and what I learned is our resident birds prefer coming to us when our deck is cleaned. As soon as I swept and rinsed off the deck, around 40 sparrows came for a visit. One of my favorite fellows came by.... one of my Red Headed Finches. I tried to capture him in motion on one of our feeders!