My DD and her BF and their dog and cat left early Friday morning to drive back to New Orleans. I miss them horribly. After ten days of noise and commotion, of various people coming and going, cooking and eating, talking and laughing and sleeping over, my house is almost spookily quiet.
Part of my brain apparently thinks they’re still here. I’ve had to stop myself three times now from getting up to let the dog in from the backyard. Their dog loved my backyard. Well, she loved the sticks. Which she piled up on the deck, right outside the door, like an offering to the tree gods. Or a barricade to keep us in.
I find myself waiting for the escalating volume of the spit-hiss-growl that meant the cats were having another close encounter of the curmudgeonly kind. And I swear I can still hear the faint chiming riiiiing of that Civ5 computer game — not quite a bell tone, more like someone running a wet fingertip around the rim of a wine glass. Over and over and over and over. Bells bells bells.
It’s not just me. My cat enters every room with extreme caution, not convinced the enemy has abandoned the field. She’s still spending the entire night snuggled up to my side instead of resuming her duties stalking odd noises in the night. This morning she hissed at a pair of shoes. Poor thing, she’s half-blind with old age and has to get right up next to a piece of furniture before she’s sure it isn’t occupied by The Intruder Cat, who is sort of like the Spanish Inquisition of cats. As you can see below. Totally unexpected.
I’ve been trying to get back into writing the past few days [yay. go, me] but the silence is distracting and I’m having trouble concentrating. Even as I sit here writing about how they’re gone, I half expect to hear the whir of a hair-dryer or the slam of a closet door or the sound of my DD yelling from upstairs, “Mom? Is there more laundry detergent somewhere?”
I know, wishful thinking on my part. But as much as I miss all that noise, I have to admit, the silence is rather . . . blissful.
Probably I’d enjoy it more if I weren’t suffering miserably with this sniffling sneezing aching shivering head cold from hell.
I’m telling you, allowing people to invade your solitude has consequences.
KD James 