I Disappoint the Maine Coon, Keeper of The Manor

Would that we were laughing.

The home health aide who has been with me for about a week has fallen in love with Buddy the Outrageously Large Maine Coon (Forever Kittenette) -- click on the link and you'll see the fun of those days not so long ago,  before hospital beds 'n such, when filling the pill container for the week meant watching Buddy get distracted by Little Dobby and... crinkly paper.  Anyway, she calls him her "dog," and he actually sits and makes obscene google eyes at her, even pulling off these quasi-sexual winks and head dips.

It feels an outrageous interruption to request a bedpan in the middle of their trysts.

In the rest of the feline world, Dobby continues to run for his life, with panache -- tail up, ears back, eyes aglow.

Buddy and Dobby, both, as well as Marmy Fluffy Butt, have avoided being drugged, and all three report happy lives, though feel underfed.

Buddy and his Loving Home Health Aide missed each other today, however, part of why our laughter was hypothetical, part of why he was on High Alert until just moments ago.  He may be part dog, this wonderful Maine Coon, just as we have genetically determined that Little Dobster is approximately 90% angel and 10% House Elf.  (Marmy Fluffy Butt defies scientific quantification.)

No one notified us that Loving Home Health Aide was going to be out, and so the key tucked under the drawbridge secret hiding spot nearest Marlinspike Hall's Bronze Entrance Doors went unused as Scary Home Aide banged her way in, waking the dead and those of us toying with that estate.

Fred had been up Doing Duty until dawn.  Loving Home Health Aide had the habit of letting herself in, having a few moments of private google eyes with "the dog," checking on me, then  making the most delicious rye toast and coffee you've ever enjoyed.  Fred could sleep in peace. Even I could drift off, if that odd occurrence came about.

This morning?  Fred slipped; Fred slid. Fred let in Scary Home Aide, asked me if I was "okay with everything," then fell back into what evolved into snoozy restlessness.

And Buddy, who would, even being a fearless pooch, normally hide in the presence of strangers, took up a big-eyed, large-chested stance on... my chest, peering into my eyes with huge question marks. "Defendor of The Manor, really?"

Scary Home Aide did nothing overtly Scary. She simply did what she wanted.  Heading into the closest medieval kitchen to "wash up" the the coffee cup and the plate I had dirtied, I heard no running water, no squishing feet (hard to do in a medieval kitchen!) and I measured the passing of over 20 minutes.

The bed bath was as if a novelty, and not to me, for whom it still is, but for her, for whom it is supposed to be a regular task.

But the things that led to the later need to call my go-to-guy good doctor due to ethereal blood pressure? A knife that would chill your blood. The cooptation of a big old box of my medications -- another unearthly amount of time spent alone with a box that needed only to be set down in my former office, left there, left ALONE there, deposited there in drug solitude -- oh, you get it?!  Weirdly, the thing the flattened my neurons was the repeated retiring to the Sitting Room, out of sight, "to read my book."

Loving Home Health Aide took time off, too.  There is not endless activity, fun, toe-twirling to be had in caring for a gimp in pain with the basic of human needs. She also has a slight affinity for cooking shows -- the spicier sort of profiles -- and, sigh, mistaking me for one of those educators who mistook her students for her own children.  I can talk that talk, and have my parenting opinions, but tend to respect parents over educators in that regard. So she mistakes Buddy for a dog, me for a parent, and I make the perennial mistake of hoping a hiree is a friend.  We may all be in the right, though there is some certainty in the Maine Coon remaining a cat and me resting childless.

However, Loving Home Health Aide sits by the hospital bed, comfortable in a rocking chair, and making use of an ottoman if she (or Buddy) chooses.  Respectful of Fred and how much of this whole endeavor aims to reduce noise and increase his potential for rest, she stays nearby, you know, where she is needed?

So what is wrong with me that I could not just say any of the dozens of assertive things to Scary Home Aide that would have rectified the maladaptive situation?  One was that she made it known pretty quickly how close by she resided. Two is that I am something of a wimp around certain sorts, even when I am paying their meager salary.  I also kept thinking dumb stuff like, "You're a dumb gimp and this just exemplifies that."

Buddy kept singing into my ears that Loving Home Health Aide would have called Fred first thing and kicked her to the curb... and we all could have used our litter boxes and bedpans, had kibble and practiced winking and giggling.

I love the way Dobby keeps hanging in there. "Here I am, back here!
The older one, wiser! Halloooo!"

© 2015 L. Ryan