Happy Saturday, everybody.  Bwakfat and I just made the 2 1/2 hour drive to Mum's house in PA and we're having a party!!

Please feel free to join us -- and please sign in with your TPM username.  If you do, you'll get a free beer.

(clink!)

 

 

I moved here to the poor side of Pelham about 5 years ago.  Yes, there really is a poor side of Pelham. 

Within two months, there was a shooting across the street in a building that was a bar but is now an office, thanks to the bar closing because of the shooting.

During the shooting, my exBF Billy and I were in bed and we heard these three noises that all sounded like gunfire and not backfire, so I stayed cowering in bed while Billy crawled to the window to see what was going on.  The only reason he dared to do this is because we live three stories high (well, now I only do, but that's another story) and he figured he could peek down without being seen.

He saw:  A man run out of the bar (which is now, of course, an office building) and get inside an old beat up white station wagon with a tan top, and it cruised around our corner and up our hill and was gone.  He then came back to bed and said, "I dunno what that was all about, but I wish to hell your office had never moved up here."  (I had relocated to be closer to my job).  He then proceeded to say a lot more, but I'll leave that up to you all to ponder.

The next day, the local news stated they didn't know what had happened at the bar across the street other than that it appeared to be a love spat involving a local girl and an out-of-town guy who shot another guy three times in the arm and then ran into a getaway car.

So I promptly walked over to my local police station and gave them a description of Billy's birds-eye-view of the getaway car in hopes it might help.  I then went home and told Billy what I'd done and he went ballistic and wouldn't speak to me for three days straight.  This from the man who invited three Jehovah's Witnesses in, no, sorry, they were Mormons, to talk to me about my beliefs but every time they rang the doorbell I'd send HIM down and make him answer the freaking door.  But, I digress.

So, anyway, it's now six years since I moved here to the cheap side of Pelham (yes, there really is one, trust me) and I walked tonight to my local deli at 10:30 at night cuz I know it's open until midnight, and it's a lovely warm night and I enjoyed my walk there, and I get to the counter with my goods and talk with the guy who is always, I mean always, behind the counter, and he asks how I'm doing and asks if I want my usual deal on cigs and I say no, not tonight, I have two packs already that he sold me for $5 each, cuz they treat me well there cuz I'm there every day, and then he tells me he's really tired.  So I say, "Take a vacation."  And he says, "I can't.  I work for my brother the owner and I can't take time off."  I say, "Can you find another job?" and he says, "What, with my broken English and no skills other than this?".

His brother owns the deli and they are from Yemen.  Or Yaman.  I'm still not sure, exactly, cuz I still have a hard time with his accent and mostly go by facial expressions.  He says Saudi.  I trust him.

He's learning his brother's business and running the place while his brother with the nice SUV only visits on weekends and owns the bigger deli in Mount Vernon.  He works for his brother six days a week and has no life, no wife, no nothing while he's learning the trade.  I asked him tonight, "Do you like it here in the States?".  He said "No, not really.  But life at home was no better, and here I can at least maybe learn something and get my own deli, so I work hard."

While we're talking, a girl knocks on the door of the deli.  Normally, people just swing the door open and stride in, and so we both look perplexed at her as she knocks at the door, looking in plaintively at us.  He goes and opens the door a crack and she comes in sideways through the door in a circus-like move and says, "There are kids' bikes blocking your door.  I thought you were closed."

I say good night to my cashier friend who misses his home and I start to walk out the door and sure enough, there is a little black bike blocking the door, sitting outside on an otherwise long sidewalk.  So......I push the door ALL the way open and force the bike to go scratching its way along the sidewalk in my effort.  On purpose.

And this young kid, 12?  13?  is standing next to another kid his age, and they are both standing next to an SUV occupied by two teens in their late teens, and this young kid says, "Yo, lady!  That's my bike!!!" and starts moving up to me.

I say back, "Yo, this is a doorway you're blocking!"

He says back, "Yo, I just have it parked here on the sidewalk, bitch."

I say back, "It's in my way and blocking the door of a business, kiddo." 

And then my deli counter friend peeks out and says, "She had the right."

And the kid says, "Whoa, she damaged and scraped my bike!".

And I see all his friends start getting all angry and defensive and my deli guy says, "Move on, get out of our doorway," and then he wisely goes back in his store.

Heh, I don't blame him.

So I said, "Did I damage your bike any more than it's already fucked up?  Cuz it looks pretty fucked up to me."

And the kid and his friends take a step back. 

He does dare to say, "Well, you should probably owe me something for that."

And I said, "Well you should probably leave deli doorways open to customers, friend."

And with that, I walked away.

I walked two and a half blocks home, with no interference, turning around now and then to make sure I had no one following me, and keeping my hand on my car keychain which has my alarm on it.  And no interference whatsoever.

My corner deli.  Welcome to Pelham, the first town in Westchester.  Welcome to Pelham, the northside of the tracks.  You know, the poor section.

On the night of December 15, 2006, the three-year anniversary of my father's passing, my beloved cat Jupiter died in my arms.  I was devastated as I listened to him take his final breaths, knowing it was too late to get him to the clinic.  That was a night I will never, ever forget.  I had become so attached to him in the three years that he stayed with me, I paid for a personal cremation and an urn for his ashes, money being no object.  I'm kinda silly that way, I guess, but really -- he was my baby.  Pets are just like children, you can't tell me otherwise unless you have a cold heart.

Two days after his passing I was so miserable and bereft I made the decision to drive down to Long Island to visit the famous North Shore Animal League, one of the best no-kill shelters on the East Coast.  I had seen a pair of cats on their website that I just knew I had to meet.  What I wanted was a set of siblings so that, while I'd be at work all day, they could keep each other amused.  I'd always felt guilty leaving Jupiter alone in the apartment.  And I wanted them to already be neutered, and litter-box trained.  These two specific cats I'd seen online totally fit the bill, the only drawback being that were already 8 months old, and I, like so many others, would've preferred younger, "cuter" kittens.  

Lucky for me, when I got to the shelter the brother cats were still there.  Sadly, many people found them to be too big, too "old", and too unfriendly and skittish.  Their handler, a very sweet girl named Dorit, warned me that they were very fearful cats, but then assured me that when she sat alone with them during the day, they were very loving.  They just needed time to adjust to people.

Dorit told me that one of the brothers had been found in the backyard of a fellow NSAL employee when he was only three months old.  They captured his brother a month later.  She gave me their medical history, had me fill out a ton of paperwork, and then took me into a small room where I could sit with her and the two boys alone without interference from others.  As expected, the two of them were terrified in my presence.  The smaller and darker of the two, Willie, allowed me to pet him but seemed very nervous about it, while the larger brother Wallace simply ran into a corner and hid in a cupboard.  Dorit apologized upside down and backwards and asked if I'd rather meet some other cats instead, but something about Willie reminded me of Jupiter and I decided then and there to take them.  

According to North Shore's guidelines, I was supposed to "donate" $75 per cat, for a total of $150, but they were so grateful to me for adopting two older, unwanted brother cats that they told me I could have them for free.  That just made me so sad I made the donation anyway....well, okay, I donated $75 but then spent another $60 in the League's store, buying toys, cat beds, food, supplies...

They were quiet enough in the car the whole way home until I got near the house and then one of them started wailing.  I brought them upstairs to my apartment and let them out of their cage in the small dressing room that now houses their litter boxes.    They promptly ran into the bathroom and hid behind the toilet together for three hours straight.  Then I let them have the run of the place and they promptly hid underneath the bed for a whole day.

Eventually they moved into the living room, curious about me and wanting to surreptitiously check me out.  One would hide in one covered cat bed, the other in a cardboard box.  I tried to pet Willie and he curled up in the back of the cardboard box to get away from my hand.  I found this disheartening so then I moved on to Wallace in the cat bed.  He amazed me by purring and then floored me when he rolled onto his back so I could stroke his belly.  That takes a lot of trust.  So I got encouraged by that and kept working on him and eventually within a few days he was sitting on my lap.   Once Willie saw this, he started hanging out by my feet.

Three years later and Da Boyz as I call them are the most affectionate I could want them to be.  Willie still doesn't like to sit in my lap, nor be held up in my arms for long, but Wallace if he could have his way would have me hold him and carry him around 24/7.  They are very good (except with houseplants, which I've learned not to put on the floor) and they know not to jump on the kitchen table nor the counters.  I love them to pieces and I'm happy to say they adore me right back.  When I surprise them by coming home for a few minutes on my lunch hour some days, I find them curled up together on the sofa, which always makes me happy.

I miss Jupiter tremendously, he was a very loving cat, but these two shelter boys have totally won my heart.

So please, if you want to adopt kittens from a shelter -- and I strongly urge you to go to a no-kill one -- don't overlook the older, skittish cats who are almost a year old or even older.  Same with dogs.

They might be hard to get used to at first, but.....they'll love you all the more for giving them a chance.

If you can't take in a pet, at least consider donating to the NSAL or your local shelter.  Animals have feelings too.

Cuz it's late and no one cares this late at night what's posted, heh heh heh.

Here's a poem about hope (yes, I still love Obama, dammit, but he's starting to make me have certain doubts).  Feel free to add your poems.

I am smart enough to know
that the end has come
or is coming

and I am comforted enough to feel
at peace with it

I think

But there is always that nagging doubt
that woulda shoulda coulda

That hope
That belief

That niggling doubt that keeps me going
and smiling my pretty smile
and hoping
that the end is just the beginning

and the beginning comes to an end