Father’s Day

Today has been an excellent Father’s Day. I slept in, enjoyed some serious cuddle time with my girlfriend, Lannette, and have had lots of time to work on my network server.

Lannette made an excellent breakfast, and when I went downstairs to eat, two cards were waiting at my table setting, one from her and one from her son, Logan. Both cards were beautiful and touching, and Lannette had slipped a CompUSA gift card inside the Father’s Day card.. My son, Keith, told me that his present would be coming later in the day.

And what a present it was! Keith has always been artistic, as evidenced on this site in his Pokemon drawings from several years ago, but he also has great musical talent and recently started spouting poetry like a fountain. (I wish my muse was as active as his!)

Keith’s present to me is the following poem, and I’m very proud of him for writing it and presenting it to me.

 

“The Man Who Loves Me”

The man who loves me
Holds me tightly when needed,
But also gives me the freedom to find my own
Way.

The man who loves me
Supports my every venture,
And gives me the strength should I
Fail.

The man who loves me
Is never judgmental,
But has the wisdom to offer guidance when I’m
Wrong.

The man who loves me
Knows my pain;
Even if he’s never told, he can see it in my
Eyes.

The man who loves me
Stands beside me,
Even if he’s far away I can feel him with
Me.

The man who loves me
Is my hero.
I hope one day to be the person my father taught me to
Be.

— Keith Johnson

You’re well on your way to being that person, son. Thank you.

Isabelle and Steel River Three

I wrote yesterday about how my cat, Isabelle, needed a new home. One of the people from work took her home to introduce her to the family, and since she brought back an empty pet carrier, it was evidently a successful introduction. I hope that Isabelle brings joy and light to her new family, and that they give her the love and attention she deserves.

Since this is supposed to be a creativity journal, rather than a diary, I should talk a bit about what I’ve been doing that’s creative during the long dry spell in this journal.

Since I last made regular journal entries, I have continued to play music and attend writing groups, though not with as much vigor as I did before. I needed some space and brain cells to deal with Real Life Occurrences, and keeping an online creativity journal was neither a priority nor a need. I gave up the reins of the West Side Books website, as well, and scaled back my involvement in writing groups from three groups to only one.

The music I have been playing has been primarily acoustic, and I have been playing with a trio called Steel River Three for about the last year. We have had several gigs and were even taped for a local access cable television production. We have a copy of that performance, and currently give out free DVDs at our shows.

SR3 is a good group. I have played with the two other members for a while now, both assisting them with short notice gigs for their other project, the Dante band and performing with them at a benefit for the Summit Apartment fire victims in January of 2003. (My old band, Eight Inch Weeds, also played at that benefit.)

Last night, I practiced four songs that we are adding to the set list for an upcoming show. It’s nice to have a small list of gigs on the schedule; it feels like we’re accomplishing something.

Isabelle

Isabelle
Isabelle
I have a wonderful tabby cat named Isabelle. She’s lived with me for over four years, and has never had any significant problems. Recently, though, another cat moved into the house. We introduced the cats through a closed door for a period of about two weeks, then let them meet, supervised. There was initially a bit of territorial juggling, but it seemed that things had evened out.

Until last week.

Isabelle suddenly decided that Artemis was no longer welcome in the house, and started attacking her. Now, Isabelle is a very small, thin cat. She weighs only about 6-7 pounds. Artemis is much bigger, and outweighs Isabelle by double, at least. This, of course, was no deterrent to Isabelle, who came away with large tufts of Artemis fur in every encounter.

We tried isolating Isabelle in a large kennel and keeping her in the same room as the other cats so they could see that she could hiss, but could do them no harm. Unfortunately, Isabelle became very agitated in the kennel, dumping her water dish into her litter and flinging mud all around the cage.

For me, that was the last straw. It’s clear that the message Isabelle is sending is that she will not allow Artemis to live in the same house with her. Unfortunately, since Isabelle is the aggressor, I feel obliged to remove her from the situation.

I have taken her to work with me today, and posted signs with the above picture, asking someone to take her in. If no one responds, I will have to take her to a no-kill cat shelter in Boulder this afternoon.