Job Needed

Hi, Carolyn Holbrook. I guess you just poked me. Thanks. Sorry for being so lame. There is no excuse for it. I limp because it's comfortable to limp. My ex-cat, Francis, started to limp one day. I brought him in. He liked Doctor Jim, notable since as a smart man cat, he avoided men, except two, not other people's favorites, and dogs. At the vet, Fran leaped from the table without sign of a limp. Dr. Jim said that if Fran was still limping by Friday, he'd test him for diabetes. I told that to Franny at home, who had returned to limping in the hall, apparently for effect. Then, following a separate warning, since he wouldn't let me brush him fully, Fran removed the mat he had let form near his anus and deposited it at the door of my and my dad's former office. It might have made me look bad at the vet that he had grown, that I had let him grow what I had termed rasta balls. I saved the mat after Fran expertly removed it with his teeth, that my sister, visiting, verified was gross to hear described when I showed it to her. In the end, Franny lasted outside each day almost sixteen years without bodily injury. He hunted. He left the house in the morning in Minnetonka as if he were a fire fighter and returned at noon to eat cat food, even after slaying and eating half a junior rabbit. He never gave up cat food or his dish of water in the kitchen. Lizards in Texas, beheadings, bitter tasting, probably, so he didn't swallow them. He walked -- then and then -- the edge of the property as if he had read the deed. He was a Himalayan/tabby mix from upstate New York, gray long hair. Here is the point of my correspondence: I have enjoyed three paid teaching days in Minnesota, since my return in 1996. All three paid days were fielded through S.A.S.E., all three at Patrick Henry. I loved it there. I hope never to become certified to teach. I'd go in again, especially to Saturday morning detention. The kids were so responsive to my creative writing lesson that morning. Did the proctor tell you, as she told me, the kids had never liked a lesson as much as they had liked that lesson. Please get me a job! Is there a way? I'd hoped to be in St. Paul tonight for Mankwe's performance. Stan Kusunoki invited me. I lost time today, so I feel welfare-lost in outer space again. It's $1.33/hour for a 24-hour day that covers medical co-pays and insurance only. The last therapist, a nice one at JFCS, said I'd be unable to hold a job. I have signed up for a job fitness test in Minneapolis in August. Minnesota Workforce Center offers the test but has been otherwise uncivil. -- If you go this evening, please give everyone my regards. ~AMB

Dr. Abuzzahab

My pdoc (as psychiatrists are called in the bipolar community), Dr. Faruk S. Abuzzahab, Sr., M.D., Ph.D. appeared on the cover of the New York Times last Sunday for accepting $50,000 over several years (1998-2005) from drug companies to promote their products or else it was for research of their products. I participated in some of that research -- the goal has been to make "safer" anti-psychotics, of which I am typically on a very low dose (in manic-depression those are used as "mood stabilizers"). Dr. Abuzzahab's clinical neighbor, Dr. John Simon, accepted $350,000 from manufacturers in the same period.

I know from personal experience that Dr. Abuzzahab meets with many, many patients who are on Medicare. His client base is his main source of income and activity. Medicare, it is known, underpays the doctors by a lot. Dr. Simon's office seems much less busy with patient care. Dr. Abuzzahab lost a patient and a $50,000 lawsuit some years ago, resulting in a temporary loss of his license. During that period, he became certified in alternative medicine.

I really like the old guy. He has moved to St. Louis Park from Minneapolis and seems to be seeing fewer patients(?). I need to get an appointment with him and perhaps finalize our relationship and my medication regimen. I shall miss him if this is the beginning of his retirement, one I had expected for some time as he is older in years and was probably trying to see too many patients. [My appointment on July 2 was one of our best; my med's are adjusted. We talked details. I told him about Icarus Project, and we looked up "icarus" together. He said nothing about retiring. Dr. Simon has gone into a hospital-only practice, as one of my former pdoc's has done. It is notoriously difficult to find a pdoc in the Twin Cities (but this is a different issue) as they mostly run waiting lists.]

Things I learned from Dr. Abuzzahab:

1. There is nothing to say you have to stay on medications for your whole life.
2. Cogentin is constipating.
3. The newer anti-psychotics are safer than the old ones. (After a little beta-testing on my part, I liked the old one, nicknamed try-laughing, better even than the best of the new ones, Abilify, and find it plenty "safe." The risk in those drugs is a condition called Tardive Dyskinesia. I have shown a few signs of TD, namely, stiff muscles, ergo I take Cogentin.)[6/22/07: Ignore these temporary pronouncements about medications; Cogentin may not be needed with Abilify.]
4. Present yourself, resume in hand, at the desk of colleges and universities.
5. If you dissertated and defended your dissertation and have the diploma in hand, you are a doctor (Ph.D.).
6. Try living with an older couple who have an empty nest.
7. Poets are known to be eccentric.
8. Three drinks: one before dinner, one during dinner, one after dinner.
9. Nat Shermans may be the best cigarette, but you are hooked. (Only Dr. Abuzzahab tried at every meeting to get me to quit or cut down on tobacco, using Wellbutrin (Zyban) and nicotine substitution.)
10. Respect your mother.
11. Your symptoms are simply worse than your sister's whose depression is milder.
12. Being late is human.
13. Your lateness upsets the other patients.
14. He is from Beirut, Lebanon and is a Muslim.
15. If you are in need of money, you go to a grocery store and put food in bags for people.
16. Your job is to write fiction and poetry.

The deer

The deer live amongst us. When I was young, my mother said there were more horses per capita in Minnetonka than anywhere else in the country. They used to clop down the street, plopping manure: Appaloosas, Pintos, Buckskins. Mostly, girls rode western-style, bareback or with a saddle. Gardeners disagree about the deer, who moved in after the horses left. Some say development at the creek forced the deer into the residential neighborhoods. There are many, many deer. They run in the defended marshlands and city parks. The deer eat roses and hostas. Gardeners shoo them; night snipers paid by the city shoot them. I vote for the deer. The deer come through the woods, into our yard, and up the driveway alone or in groups of two or more. Sudden sounds startle them and split them up loping through the woods. Young deer chatter to their mothers. Protective mothers -- the tawny ones not the gray-beige ones -- stand alone and grimace at you (who are also standing alone). Branches break underhoof in the night.

Bluejays

The blue jays came to build a nest in the blue spruce near the glass door where I smoke. Besides smoke, I also talk to myself and even jump or shout occasionally. The househusband who lives down the hill with his wife and daughter has not complained. Once, during the day, I yelled, "Get me outta here!" like a smoking Jane Fonda. I was recalling being in a hospital in Houston, where of course, I did not shout or yell. Holler is a southern word fer it.

Slowly, but surely, the female and the two male bluejays had built the nest. It is the best evergreen in the yard. The males were positioning toward the spruce in the front yard -- white, I think, but the woman bluejay chose the blue one. I kept smoking and slamming the glass door as usual. Soon, she was nesting in her little basket. She was soft and endearing. The two males came near occasionally, even once stood guard.

The cat was at my feet. I have tried to talk with him, but he is no Franny, who could respond to ordinary verbal remarks. The new cat, Wally, is a teenager. He killed a finch last week. We are eager for the birds -- whose numbers have diminished recently, the newspaper says due to swine flu [West Nile Virus]; I don't like to think about "flu" too much, so would rather just cheer on birds to replenish. That we had a nest was a great boon to my spirits. Blue jays eat the eggs of other birds, so my mother was acting uninterested in hearing of the nest nor did she seem worried that Wally might kill the mother jay, which thought drove me to distraction. One day, after watching her for days, she did not return to the nest. After many hours had passed, I went inside the branches of the tree to see whether eggs were in it. None was there. I inquisitioned Wally, who remained silent. He acted like a turd and went under that tree for a nap. Alas, I suppose he ate her. I hate him, but I reflect that at the same age, all my wunderbar cat Fran did was snap the heads off lizards in the yard in Houston.

The male jays have returned to the nest to peck it a bit. They shouldn't have left the woman so alone. They should have guarded her. They act confused. She built most of the nest for their little group. They are probably wondering how to transport it, how to take it with them. They or she wove a plant marker they had pilfered from my mother's gardens into the nest, label side out. It says, "$24.99. Dwarf Korean lilac."

Animals in Reverse

Francis would have liked an orderly biography; Lucy did not want one. I know because when I started to write the story of her life, called Lucy's Story, about her recovery from catnip, it was not the real story. In the fake story, she took the subway to AA. In reality, she lost interest in the catnip, because it had gotten stale -- one day she turned her nose up at it and walked away. She was still alive when I started work on her story. She lived a remarkable life, for a cat -- even if she had not been a cat -- in a series of wonderful apartment buildings and in five cities. About this book of her life, she sat in my lap and pointed her ears back while I typed, not back flat, but enough back so that I could tell she wasn't a fan of histories herself, even though hers is a good one, with few details too embarrassing to mention, or, if embarrassing in someone else -- not in her -- and for us instructive. In fact, Lucy preferred art, and before she died, she had learned to sculpt using her favorite red yarn -- favorite since early cathood -- in large cursive letters: G, L, J, and the symbol for pi. Lucy Rain Cat, I called her, and Lucy Bourgeoise.

In the 3-part story of Francis' demise, called "Animals, part 1," "Animals, part 2," and "Animals, part 3," the time element is misleading. I wrote all three passages on or about December 29, but the record (that follows) shows December 29 for the first two parts and December 27 for the third part. Technically, the third part was written last, not first, as the line-up suggests. Left in reverse order as I wrote the parts, with most recent near the top, next recent next, and so forth, the story read out of order, so I reordered them. Rather than delete the place for December 27, I reused it. Today is January 1, 2007.

Animals, part 1

Fiction International is "the only literary journal in the United States emphasizing formal innovation and progressive politics. [Its] thematic issues feature controversial fiction, nonfiction, indeterminate prose, and visuals by leading writers and artists from around the world."

Fiction International is sponsoring its next theme issue on animals. The deadline for submissions was December 15. Even though I had written nothing about animals that I could send to the journal, the idea gives me the spur to write about my cats and their life experiences.

Francis was a good, gray, wool cat whose father was likely Himalayan, which accounts for the way he strutted the barriers of the yard, walking on fences and edges, as if he had read the deed. Fran died on March 31, 2005 at the age of nearly 16. His birthday was May 8, 1989. We still miss him and end up lavishing too much motherly attention on his successor, Walter (Wally), whom we picked at the Humane Society on January 22, 2006, almost one year ago. Wally's papers indicate that he was 8 months at the time of adoption, placing his birthday some time in May 2005.

Animals, part 2

When Francis died, he died twice. He had lost half his body weight -- 13 pounds down to 7 pounds -- and he had lost the hair on the sides of his body due to renal failure. He had made a trip to the hospital just a few weeks before that and had regained half a pound after a feline version of dialysis. He weighed 10 pounds again within a few days back at home, then boom, his bottom suddenly fell out; his weight plummeted and his hair fell out. On his final day, he ate, drank water, visited the litter box and even went outdoors.

Fran was an outdoorsman cat and used to hunt each day as if he were on pest patrol; he headed out each morning like a fireman. The last day was no exception, even though his walking was weak and impaired. We were very fortunate in Francis that he was never attacked outdoors or hit by a car, even though he shared the woods with deer, raccoons, foxes, owls, hawks, and later a coyote. He survived a scare with neighbor dogs once in Houston, and that is the lesson that taught him to stay in his own territory and not stray. He led an adventurous life without injury.

On his last day, we lay in bed together looking into each other's eyes, something we liked to do anyway, and suddenly his eyes glazed over, and he wasn't there anymore, even though he was still breathing. I got up, called the vet, and we made an immediate appointment to bring him in. Emergency resuscitation would keep him alive over the weekend, she said when I got there. She estimated he could live one month more with constant dialysis. Since I wasn't paying the vet bill myself, I estimated what it might cost. The weekend alone would cost $750. I asked the vet about euthanasia. We began to discuss it. She asked whether I was satisfied with the time I had spent with him until recently.

Yes, I said.

Since Fran had the chronic rather than acute type of renal failure, we had managed to have a lot of quality time together, to the point of literally falling in love with each other after my other cat, Lucy, had died in 2001, also of chronic renal failure, a common condition in older cats. I reluctantly agreed to have what was left of Francis put to sleep, as much as I wished he might die naturally on his own. His body was still too strong otherwise, and he might go on breathing, his heart beating, but never return to consciousness.

Animals, part 3

The vet put an IV in Fran's arm and injected him with a lethal dose of barbiturate. Fran's head folded over his paws, and he slept.

Because he died twice, once at home and once at the vet, his eyes and mind first, his body second, there were a series of visions after that. He appeared to me as a ghost, growing ever woolier and wilder, until he looked in the passage like a wolverine.

In the winter Francis sat in the utility room downstairs, in the corner of the room called the sump area, a dugout rough and rusty looking, where the pipes all meet in vertical poles. His winter hunting was limited mostly to indoors, since he disliked snow on his feet and left the outdoor animals alone during the cold months. He captured about three mice indoors per year by staking out the sump area of the utility room. This hunting of his reminded me of ice fishing. He sat there in the dark in the middle of the night, concentrating steadily, staring straight forward. I would come upon him doing his night ritual if I went into the utility room to do something -- throw away something in the large wastebasket or get a hammer or screwdriver or change the litter box. There he might be, staring straight ahead, prepared to kill mice, or mice in theory. The number of times he managed to do that -- catch mice indoors -- reminds me of publishing, the number of times writers manage to do that, though they hunt indoors and fish for it.

The day after he died a mouse ran at me, where I stood in the middle of the office; I was in fact trying to think of a beginning of a life without Fran, without Lucy. The mouse ran directly down the center of the hallway, veered into the office, and charged almost at my feet then turned away and ran to the utility room. Aghast, I thought we might be infested now with mice. Fortunately, that is not what happened. There was one mouse only, and when it died of starvation in the utility room, it smelled.

Immediately following upon Fran's death, rabbits, among his favorites for hunting, gathered in the back yard under the birdfeeder and stood there. They were not hopping, not running, and not hiding; they were standing about and lingering, loitering. I had never seen rabbits loitering before, regarding their cousins.