familiar

February 16, 2022

Our Celebrity Status

The four-footed one has become a bit of a celebrity at our local coffee shop. It’s just one of those things that happened. I can’t even tell you how it really happened.

Maybe it’s because we tend to take her with us everywhere, and she’s a relatively rare breed for here. Perhaps it’s her spunky personality. I don’t know. But we took her with us one day to get coffee, and she popped up her little head as if to say “hello” to the person at the drive-through window. It turns out that this person knew the four-footed one’s breed and thought she was adorable. She fussed over little Ms. Four-Feet.

Soon after that encounter, any time we hit the drive-through, the whole staff knew that the four-footed one was with us, and everyone would take a turn to greet her. From there, it moved to staff members giving her cookies while we waited for our drinks.

These days when we pull up to order, they will ask if the four-footed one is with us. Then, before we even get to the window, they form what feels like a receiving line. Heck, if the four-footed could wave her paw just so, you’d think we had a real celebrity on our hands.

July 8, 2021

What If

Sometimes, when it’s still and it seems as if time has stopped, I will watch Beloved sleep and wonder what if. What if a chance encounter, a brief meeting with a mutual friend, hadn’t happened. I wonder what he would be doing if things had been different.

Sometimes, when he has his head buried in a book, I will look at Beloved and marvel at how I’m not just thrilled to have him in my life, but to want of future of days watching him reading.

Other times, as he explains to me the exact method to make the perfect tea or why he needs a bit of salt in his coffee, I wonder if I will ever grow tired of these conversations.

Years ago, I vowed that I was happy not seeing the same face across the table from me each morning. I vowed not to become enthralled with the routine to the point that I was lulled into boredom.

But I tripped through Beloved’s wires, or he worked his way through a crack in my armor, and there he is. The same face greets me each morning, and I am not yet bored by it. I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve heard about the tannins in tea and how they can affect bitterness. I don’t mind because it’s Beloved telling me this over and over again as he carefully makes his tea as if his very life depends upon it.

The spark I felt once upon a time is still there, and if the crease between his brows is deeper now, I don’t mind at all.

June 13, 2020

I Know

I listened to the tea kettle whistle, signaling the water was ready. I heard the sound of cupboards opening, water pouring, china gentle clinking together, and feet on the hard floor.

I heard the soft catch of the door opening, four-feet’s tags jingling as she hopped over the sill and onto the patio. The gentle scraping of the chair on the cement told me that Beloved had found a place to settle in and read.

Soon there was the soft quacking of Marta as she made her way up from the pond. If I know her, she will make her way to four-feet, and the two of them will settle down near his feet. At least that’s what the two of them do with me. I suspect they both hope that when I sit out there with my coffee, there will be a form of manna from heaven, although, in this case, crumbs from something I am eating.

I didn’t need to open my eyes for any of this, so familiar are the sounds that I can see through closed eyes. If I were to bet, I would bet that Beloved settled into to chair on the north side of the patio, not just because there is the shade for him either, but because he is also so familiar to me. He always sits there.

I didn’t open my eyes though; I stayed where I was, eyes closed, soaking in the soft sounds of the silence while I meditated on nothing.