Oscar...the imperfection of his actions confound us...but we love him

Oscar in the front, elder Omar his papa in the back 

Omar and his son Oscar have been with us about a month now and have settled in very well. We really love them. Oscar is a year old and Omar will 14 next month. They are truly bonded and call for each other when they are apart in the house, usually joining up for naps on the bed, and coming together for window sunnings, and movie watching at night on the couch, where all of us human and beasts are stuffed together but happy as clams. Oscar likes to snuggle with Martyn during television time, Omar is my guy.

Every morning when Martyn gets up at 5:30, I stay in bed, and the minute they hear him get up, the two of them arrive with enthusiasm on the bed, to lie on me like a couch.

We have been frustrated with some of Oscar's...confusion, and I have tried everything to get him past it. Oscar uses the litter box regularly, but about 50% of the time, he decides to go pee in the house, in a specific spot by the back door. I tried bringing in a second litter box, I tried cleaning the box-literally-about four times a day. He also will poop in one of two spots on regular basis, but still uses the litter box too. Omar has no issues.

"Can't you explain it to him, Omar?" I ask him.

I can deal with a cat poop-God does know poop is just a thing around here we don't bat an eye at-but cat pee is another issue. Fortunately, he is doing it in a spot that isn't in the main part of the house. Unfortunately it is on the old wood floor. I tried spraying different urine away products that say they keep the cat from re-peeing there. False advertising. I did not want a litter box in my front hallway, so we now put a piece of tin foil down, and then a shop rag on top of that. It keeps it from soaking in the floor. I have caught him in the act and scolded him, I have caught him in the litter box and praised him. I do know there was always sort of a doggie smell there when we moved in. The house is from 1760, I am sure someone peed there at some point, maybe a moose, maybe an early settler. It's just odd he immediately used the litter box regularly, and then started this behavior. The spot he is going on is literally about six feet around the corner to his box.

We talked about separating them and putting Oscar out with the elders. But I couldn't do it. I am sure Omar would have actually kind of liked his independence in the house, but they really are bonded. I've never seen a male father cat so bonded with a youngster.

Omar and Oscar were relinguished to the shelter. From what I understand, they came from a very cat heavy population household that it sounds like had grown because they had not spayed/neautered-Omar was still in tact at age 13. The couple had retired and decided to reduce the cats because they could not afford it. We think there were so many cats around that it had become a free for all. Oscar is also tiny and I would assume was inbred if Omar was running around mating. We also notice that Oscar is ravenous, where as Omar is more mellow about eating, but eats well. When Oscar was at the shelter he had runny stool for many months and they did a bunch of tests, when he arrived here his stool was fine within a few days. I think he was simply stressed. He also barfed his food quite a bit on arrival, and that has subsided, and again I think he was used to having to gorge his food with all the other cats around.

So, that is part of the deal of taking on animals. You have to work through it, try lots of different options and give it time. I really hope Oscar grows out of this one behavior. He and Omar are here to stay...assuming he doesn't start peeing on every thing...but I am confidant that isn't going to happen or he might have to live in the elder suite.

And I look at him, when he has made this mistake, he just looks so stinking perplexed. He is really a sweet guy, as is Omar.

Omar is a truly lovely guy, going on 14 in a couple weeks

Autumn is here...oh yes oh yes oh yes

I entered the barn yesterday morning humming Zippidity Do Da, the weather had me perked for happiness and enthusiasm no matter what came my way. It is technically not Autumn on the calendar, but, for me Autumn begins on September 1 and I am always so glad for her arrival. The weather cooled off for us, I even wore socks last night and a sweater as we sat outside having a glass of wine.

Oh Glory!

I'm relieved for the animals too, who take any kind of weather without complaint. I'd rather see an animal in freezing weather eating hay, than sitting in humid and hot fly infested air. I think they agree.

So, on we go to the beginning of so many things, for that is what this time of year means for me-beginnings even amongst the dying leaves. Something is always starting. Ideas, new projects, new goals, new memories, new animals...are all in front of me.

I even got on Boone yesterday and took a spin around the fields. We hope to ride into the early winter now that the flies are pretty much busted. It was good to be on him again.

More elder friends come to Apifera and I now know for sure we are in the right place

We had such a nice visit with new friends from The Lincoln Home, an elder residence in the nearby town of New Castle. It was just a lovely group of people that came, sharp and witty and full of questions.

I brought Birdie in, and all the goats, and you can probably guess who put on a kissing show. I tell you, I am so grateful when I went to get a llama that day that I picked her, she was a kisser then and is to this day.

I felt really good about our first two on site visits. Today, when I looked at the photo of Birdie kissing Phil, the gentleman in the photos here, I just thought,

We really did come to the right place.

Today we brought the benches into the orchard, so we could be in the shade, it was really hot and sticky but we had a breeze. It was good because we are planning the shade hut for the elder guests, and now I know at this time of morning there is good shade where we were, so I thought it would be nice to have some more permanent benches there.

I'm just really so happy thinks are humming along.

I think I want to try and bring Boone in on these too, but I will have to think about logistics. I left the donkeys out of today's visit because it was so hot. And to be honest, Birdie is such a presence and such a hit for people. It is the Time of the Llama. Pino has absolutely no remorse about that. He has done years of service in his own quiet way, and will continue, but we will go with the flow the universe is sending us.

My Pig: her life with a bed wetter

I've had her since I was four. She has been though so much–bedwettings on an almost nightly occurrence, then subsequent power washings by my mother, and dryings.

It's no wonder she is worn and earless...and lacks her tail.

Her name is simply...My Pig. My mother would see me as a four year old without my pig and ask, as I ventured to bedtime,

"Where is your pig?" and I would say,

"You mean My Pig."

The pink coloring she once had is now faded, and she looks like she might have taken a recent dusting due some graying. I don't want to wash her again, she might have a flashback to those times.

I can remember the feeling I had as a child though, when I held my little pig. She was one of my go-to comfort creatures back then, along with my dinosaur pajama doll-the latter also suffered greatly in bed wettings.

My bed wetting went on for a long time and kept me from going to sleepovers at my friends for many years. I can remember going to some one's house to spend the night, good family friends, and I was to stay there overnight while my parents went out of town that night. I knew this family well, but I remember hearing my mom in an adjacent room, reminding her friend that...well, I wet the bed so my mother had brought a rubber sheet.

Jeeze. Way to ruin the slumber party by bringing your own rubber sheet.

So, My Pig and I soldiered on, through rubber sheets and power washings. I eventually outgrew bed wetting, but never outgrew my pig. And she has come with me to every home I've ever lived in, including NYC, Oregon, Minneapolis and now, Maine. Back then, fifty-six years ago, we were both pink and fresh, and now all these years later we are both a bit worn but still the same at our core. She sits in my studio now and the other day I picked her up, I had not done that for some time. After all, I have lots of pigs now, ones that move and talk and eat. But when I held My Pig, I was taken back to a place far, far away–a place that still exists, but only in one place, my head. A place where the family was under one roof, the dog was in the living room somewhere with red polish I had put on her toes, and I was in my bed near the the alcove window that looked out at the elm branches, and the tiny red roses speckled in the wallpaper were all around me. And beside me, under the covers, waiting for her nightly wetting, was My Pig, not complaining, not shaming, just going to sleep with me without any fear or judgment about what was to come next.

Conversation of the pumpkins

"What a beautiful day," said one of them.

"Can you move a little, I'm feeling claustrophobic," said another deep in the pile.

"Why did she put you on top, you are the biggest?" complained another.

They all sat heaped in the wheeled tub, waiting, their destiny to be decided by me, the steward of the place and that includes vegetables. Of course, Nature herself partook, and continues too. Some of their cousins rotted in the hot sun this year, but not too many. Those orbs fed bugs and grubs.

Some of these chaps will feed the pigs. Some will sit on our stoop for us to enjoy until they soften and then will be gifted to the chickens and goats.

I have always felt affection for pumpkins. How can one not. Yes, cynics will say I am humanizing them, Disney-izying their characters. But I really do sense them as individuals, much more than tomatoes or potatoes. Everything is connected. If I believe my father is dispersed now and exists in The Wind, and that my mother and father can be seen together as red cardinals, why would I not feel the individuality of a pumpkin, and here a voice out of that orb.

I have been shamed online for this before-but I truly take to heart that I'm eating things with energy and character, be it a bean or a carrot. Before I harvested the pumpkins, I started fall pruning in the front garden which is still young and unstructured. I mainly cut back the yarrows and Queen Anne's Lace, but I thanked them all and said I'd see them next spring.

So, it is the beginning of the end for each seed that is now a beautiful little orange orb. One by one, I will pick them out of the heap and feed them to the pigs. I like to think when they are taken off the vine, that's it, they never sense a bite. But who am I to say, who are you to say, if that is true? We will never really know, unless of course someday we are in fact, a pumpkin.

I did save one giant pumpkin out in the patch. Every year, Earnest and I try to grow one of those huge pumpkins. We grow our pumpkins in the compost pile which never require water, of course, adding daily water would help, but that defeats it all. We like to see how big they can grow simply with the sky's water, and the nutrients of equine and sheep fertilizer. We have had many big ones. Earnest always says that every year he will grow a huge pumpkin and enter it in the fair. But he never has-he either forgets to enter, or eats the pumpkin. But the idea that he might grow a huge pumpkin of award winning features is just a worthwhile venture for both of us.

"Rosie! Rosie, where are you?!"

I had one of those heart stopping animal moments last night in the outer barn. I had done my nighttime feedings and chores with the sheep and equines and made my way over to Rosie's private suite. I always check on her even though she doesn't get any feed at night.

But there was no Rosie.

No problem, I ventured out to the new barn addition, which Rosie often meanders to for sun naps.

But still, I did not see Rosie.

This pig can not just vanish. While my other pigs could easily break out of this barn, Rosie is a delicate wildflower incapable of such normal pig behavior.

I looked under hay that had been left on the floor. No Rosie.

I turned, and there she was, a Sleeping Beauty like no other. She had ventured to another part of the barn, an area that had recently been filled with hay, but last weekend we created a semi loft to get more hay off the pallets, and better moving room for woman and animal.

It was the sweetest image-I took these photos. She did not even wake up, she slept through my three minutes of bewilderment. I sat with her for a spell, she hardly let out a grumpf.

Oh! Rosie!

White Dog the book...continues

I am making progress on the book about White Dog. I think one thing that I am recognizing is how much I have learned since my first book in 2010. One of the best things I did on one of my first set written books was to invest in the services of a really respected and experienced freelance editor who helped me shape the story, and focus the voice of the story–that one became became "Donkey Dream", and although I added the pie recipes and back end story later on my own, years later, the main story was very tight and good. I still feel that way.

"White Dog" is meant to happen and my plan is to finish the writing and art by year's end, then work at editing and shaping it thoroughly, and then have a fundraiser in spring. The other thing I'm realizing as I work on the book, I'm not thinking about the darn money that has to be raised. I am just writing and absorbed with the story. This is a maturation on my part, and also, I think, a sign this book just comes from a very special place. It matters not about money right now, what matters are the words and thoughts coming from White Dog through me. In some ways, I guess it is a co-memoir, but everything comes from his voice.

I aim to do him justice.