Well, there’s good news and bad news now about the kittens.
And it sways more…way more towards the bad news. So, if like myself, you should really put on Sarah McLachlan for comfort here.
So first, a neighborhood boy said he saw the nest, a month ago. And some of the kittens, if not all, were dead. He said, a lady had a bag. He didn’t seem upset, and I just said back to him, I’m sorry you had to see that. it seemed like the kids being grilled on Law and Order. I’ve been looking for that nest for so long, it apparently was a month ago, or I don’t know when.
So then, I talk to a man today on the street walking a bridled cute poodle, and he says, he has more kittens than he needs. Some of them don’t have legs. And then I say back, Oh my god. Do they need vet or rehabilitation? And he says, no, that’s how they are born. All I'm doing is trying to put the pieces together.
So there’s this one, Daphne. A darker stray, who I didn’t identify or know…she was pregnant. And so hungry that she walked up to my dinner table, and I threw her some food. Had I known her more, or seen she was really pregnant, I would have fed her way more. But on the other hand, I don’t think people need to feel responsible for feeding feral cats. They catch voles and mice. On the other hand, they probably are so desperate for food they jump in dumpsters.
So this Daphne came up to me a few times, (not as many times as Lucy), and I basically ignored her because I thought I was dreaming with Lucy. Now I feel bad, like I discriminated, or favored one cat, Lucy. No one has found the nest yet.
Daphne came out with these two kittens, and no one knows if these kittens were part of the dead ones. Or who is who. Maybe Lucy had the kittens with no limbs. I guess these feral cats don’t have the genes or the …I am speechless…to try to explain what it is…nutrition? The purebred cats I bred as a kid, came out fine. No one died. It is survival of the fittest on the streets. You do what you can, you see a cat who is able to follow you within two seconds when you put a plate down, well, you figure they are hungry.
Then, the other day I saw a piss brawl. Yesterday, in fact. It was fascinating. And I almost wish I could project it on a screen at night and have behaviorists analyze it. Well, they will someday.
So this cat here, is marooning up to this other one, who looks so low to the ground, that from the picture you would think he is sick. He’s not. They’re communicating. About what? I do not know. It was the site of where these kittens live, Daphne’s…however it is not clear…if Daphne is a street cat or belongs to this house. Two kittens survived here, and very well may be that others died.
The Ghosts
Maybe I have it all wrong. Maybe I'm the ghost.
And they led me to the dream. Without words
Only their own paws. Those are all the words they have in which to speak..
If that's true, well, how did these cats show up on videotape?
Unarmed and dangerous. The danger is only amongst themselves.
Yeah, well, you think you know.
You know nothing...
It's not easy searching for them, you have to know the dream realms.
Not really know, but be invited.
Very few can do that. I guess I found the gift to see their world.
Who is the ghost? Is it them or me? Maybe I'm the shadow, and they're real.
I'll try to go out, and check if I still have breath. But that wouldn't be until October...when the cold weather hits...
I must be the only one that can see them.
No wonder I joined the Feline Bureau of Inquiry...I'm one of the few that has eyes to see.
I hold the relic...which maybe they have lost.
Or did they remind me of something that I already know?
They cannot touch each other. Like they are in two different realms.
One is a ghost, one is real. Yet I see both, from behind the camera.
So who is appearing as the truth? No one is wrong. It is impossible. Everyone has eyes. Two, in fact. Maybe I wasn't dreaming, maybe they captured me. I saw the ghost in the dream. Now they appear. They say...You're the Ghost. No one else saw these two cats in the backyard. And tonight's a full moon.
So they do this weird dance of stillness…one looking at the other. The one in the foreground then marooning up to the one in the back, crouched down, as if she (he) cannot touch him, as if she is a ghost. She is like a cat that comes up to your leg, in a gesture of appreciation, but this one had to do it to the air to the other one in the back. Maybe the cat is a ghost, nothing but a shadow...that she cannot touch. Only feel in the other realms.
Whether they are female and male, or male and male, I don’t know. I have no idea. It needs a soundtrack like Sixth Sense because the one in the back could even be a ghost. Maybe this one in the front is a female, and is trying to size up the one in the back for mating season next year. Maybe this is just ordinary cat behavior, I don't know!
He looks so sick in the picture, from the angle I took it, but he’s not. After my video stopped rolling, they both ran off at top speeds. What this was about? I have no idea. Other than it was profoundly moving. And they were in the lawn of these kittens, so I have no idea if it is a territorial battle. Too bad I stopped the camera, after that they literally ran off at the top of their paws.
Lucy was the one I was watching for so long; the one I dreamed with. And then this Daphne came along, otherwise ugly, I saw she was pregnant but I was feeding Lucy. Well, I’m sure Daphne isn’t really ugly. She just…wasn’t as appealing as Lucy, and Lucy befriended me. Had I known all this, maybe I just make a salad bar in the backyard for pregnant cats. It isn’t my fault if they were born without legs. They have to survive.
It was you and me, Lucy, under the moon. But maybe…wait. Maybe it wasn’t Lucy I was dreaming with at all, actually I think it was her specifically. I doubt I was dreaming with, who I coined, Daphne. These kittens I do not recognize.
Why do feral cats die? Babies...is what I'm talking about.
Plus, when I had that dream with Lucy, there was a blob that was unrecognizable. Bigger than herself. Maybe it was a soul mass of all the kittens combined. It didn’t look like one kitten, that would come up to me and follow me home. Plus, no one did yet. They’re out there.
I just feel so lost. Where did the kittens go?
I asked the mother of the boy...who saw the dead kittens...did any survive. Well, she said...yes, there is still a nest. I was trying to...uncomfortably ask, did they all die. Yet she didn't speak that much English. She said, there still is a nest.
Where that nest is, I don't know. Maybe it's only in my dreams.
When the video clips get loaded on, it will all make sense.
Whatever it is, they breed their own colony. Trap neuter return could be a calamdy; something unethical. However, she does forget about her kittens, that Lucy. A year or two ago a kitten was forgotten in the fence. She forgot about it. Maybe if these street cats keep breeding year to year...they become weak. Kittens are now becoming born without limbs; deformed as the man with the poodle put it.
So then I am prompted, when Lucy looked at me that morning in dispair...did her kittens die? She looked exhausted, yet ran away. I will never forget those eyes. Heard a yowl the night before, knew it was out of the ordinary. The next morning, her stomach was flat.
What she did, I don't know. Lucy? You out there? I haven't seen you lately.
Maybe Daphne is her sister, and Lucy is too much of a wild twit to raise the kittens, and just ran off...
I have a very unsettled personality right now, for no known reason. Looking for the discovery. The big resolve...that will change everything. Solve the mystery.
They're not all dead. Some of them survived.
Maybe I fell for something in a dream. Maybe I was lured in. Just because Lucy was in my backyard. Maybe I have it all wrong. Maybe...it's her backyard, not mine.
Maybe the ghosts will unveil the truth, if Lucy cannot.
-Jackson Blake
They say...You're the Ghost.
Feline Bureau of Inquiry
