you be the judge

it's a wierd thing: judgement.
it is the distance between me and so many things. it is the wedge between me and everything i long to get closer to. i try and work it out. dissect things, pick 'em apart and mostly, mostly i try to be as generous and as open as i can. it's some crazy dance i do. i don't know why, but i do it. its demanding. it keeps me on my toes.

the biggest judgement — the big black blanket covering us up kind — is judgement of the self. how many times have i second guessed myself today — today alone?

there it is. always there, like a mirror held up too close.

CARRYING A FOOTBALL

Kevin says to Momo the triumphant:

"Why are you carrying a football?"
It is a joke, one of his better ones. I laugh as I stare at her stomach. She has about 30 or more neat stitches cutting a line down her newly shaved pink belly. In addition, she has a shaved patch where her IV was plugged in, and another shaved circle on her side, where the pain patch was. She went through a lot. Dr. Kassam, her vet says "Now Momo only has 8 lives left!" (That joke's not so good). He says it was a miracle. He says he thought they would lose her. Turns out she had a very bad stomach infection and there was fluid all up in her insides. They drained her stomach, her intestines, and flushed it all with saline. They sewed her back up.

The next day, she's already much better. She is energetic, alert and hungry. My sister goes to visit her. She wants out of the cage. The staff at the vet hospital fall in love with her.

Now she's home. She's a bit tired and she keeps looking at her stitches like they're wrong. Sometimes she tries to lick the threads or chew them. They are some kind of plastic, no? We don't care. We are so happy to have her home. Momo the triumphant. She's absolutely beautiful.

Your Hometown

Your hometown is lovely, and now that I've been here, I love you even more (if that's possible).

In honour of you, I post the lyrics to a great song by The Boss himself.

I was eight years old and running with a dime in my hand
Into the bus stop to pick up a paper for my old man
I’d sit on his lap in that big old buick and steer as we drove through town
He’d tousle my hair and say son take a good look around
This is your hometown, this is your hometown
This is your hometown, this is your hometown

In `65 tension was running high at my high school
There was a lot of fights between the black and white
There was nothing you could do
Two cars at a light on a saturday night in the back seat there was a gun
Words were passed in a shotgun blast
Troubled times had come to my hometown
My hometown, my hometown, my hometown

Now main street’s whitewashed windows and vacant stores
Seems like there ain’t nobody wants to come down here no more
They’re closing down the textile mill across the railroad tracks
Foreman says these jobs are going boys and they ain’t coming back to
Your hometown, your hometown, your hometown, your hometown

Last night me and kate we laid in bed talking about getting out
Packing up our bags maybe heading south
I’m thirty-five we got a boy of our own now
Last night I sat him up behind the wheel and said son take a good
Look around
This is your hometown

MISSING MOMO

So, my cat is in the hospital.
I am a basket case.
See, my cat eats plastic. I don't know why. We try and hide plastic from her, but she always seems to find it somehow. Sometimes I hear the familiar rustling sound — i'll know what's going on, and I'll stop her. Usually there's no plastic left out, but we recently moved and she has been taking advantage of the chaos.

The vet hospital seems very sketchy to me. They're like the dentist, they wanna rack up as much money as possible, so they offer you a bunch of tests and such that they tell you your pet really needs. They use fear tactics and make you feel like you're a bad pet owner if you say no. I hate them pretty quick. The worst part is that they think they know my cat better than I do. It could be a liver or kidney problem, they say. They wanna give Momo bloodtests, they want to sedate her, they want to give her pain killers. No, she's vomiting because she ate some bad plastic, I say. Maybe she's clogged up. Nothing's wrong with her kidneys. Yesterday, she was just fine. I tell them I only want an x-ray, an x-ray to determine if there's something stuck in her tummy. A big plastic ball. They are scared of me. They shouldn't mess with a basket case. They say they are very concerned. Yes, I'm concerned too. I'm concerned you all seem like a bunch of crooks.

They take the x-rays and the doctor tells me it looks "suspicious." I say, "Can I see?" It doesn't occur to him that I would like to see the film I just paid $270 for. He takes me into the x-ray room. I look at Momo's film, her body is so beautiful, her bones are perfect, her ribs are a masterpiece. On the film, there is, something faint and round in her stomach. I say yes to the barium test. She has to stay overnight. I don't think I'll sleep. It's so quiet here. I've swept the entire house, locked away any plastic to be found.

My cat eats plastic. I can't help it. She likes it. But maybe now, she won't eat plastic ever again.
Before I left, they had given her some drugs and her eyes were HUGE.
I really miss her.