After five years in this studio I finally did what I’ve always wanted to do and set up an oil painting station. My goal is to do at least one painting a month, both for practice and as a way to keep my spirits up in the coming months of cold and dark. And the first subjects of this were my old dog, Frieda, and my new kitten, Theory.
Yes, I have a kitten! About that…
After Aether died I contemplated the idea of going cat-less for a while. Frieda didn’t seem to mind being the only furry companion vying for my attention, and she certainly enjoyed it when I left the doors open so she could go in and out as she pleased. On nice days I enjoyed it too, even though it let flies in. A couple of these buzzed around the kitchen for over a week. It got to the point that I nearly gave them names. I joked on Twitter that I really needed a cat.
And yet the universe did not see fit to drop a cat into my life. All my previous cats had been some sort of rescue or another. Usually kittens found and tamed by family members, or they arrived fully grown, demanding a home.
No such luck this time. So I thought perhaps I will be a 100% Dog Person for a while. I had to cancel Rose City Comic Con because of COVID, and decided to use the weekend to visit Crater Lake with Frieda instead.
Of course that was the weekend the smoke from the fires in southern Oregon and northern California came and camped in Central Oregon and not only could I not bear the thought of camping in 400+ AQI atmosphere, I wouldn’t even be able to see the lake!
So instead, on September 10th I bundled Frieda into the car and drove down to the local Humane Society shelter, and after going up and down and all around their cat kennel and holding all the kittens I came away with a tiny black girl-kitten who, after a lot of talking back and forth, accepted the name Theory.
In the intervening weeks she has grown from a tiny ball of fuzz to a striking young lady who has a lot of opinions about gourmet raw kitten food (she’d rather I feed that and only that) and her jingle toy (she’d rather play with it any time she is not eating gourmet raw kitten food). In between eating and playing she has adopted Frieda as her surrogate mom. Frieda has accepted this with admirable fortitude, and more often than not I look around for my small black animal only to find her as an extension of my large(r) black animal. It is all very Halloween-y and seasonal and very very adorable.
And even though I must now be exceptionally vigilant when opening and closing doors, everything feels better. I had joked that nothing could fill the hole that Aether left and so I adopted a void, but it really is true that sometimes the only thing that makes the loss of a loved one bearable is finding a new one to love.
Also, it is nice not having flies buzzing around the kitchen.
