Yesterday morning I went to visit my parents and help with an afternoon of errand-running. My father is still healing after a recent surgery, and while the healing is going very well, he’s still not able to do any heavy lifting. That’s where I came in. I went to help with pushing the shopping cart, loading some heavy and unwieldy purchases into it and then into the car… that sort of thing.
On the way to their house I encountered a few photo opportunities, as I’ve been working on lyric translations lately, and decided to start adding photos to each one. In particular, I took photos that made me think of the lyrics to Waterfall (in my parents’ neighbourhood) and PENDULUM (on the stairs of an Ottawa train station).
I got in some shopping while helping my parents run their errands, and once we were done with with those for the day, my parents drove me back home, along with a very unwieldy purchase of my own… a cat tree for Scout!
My studio apartment isn’t huge, but it’s the perfect size for one person, especially given that there are plenty of great walking spaces nearby. For an indoor cat, however, I figure it could get a little dull, which is why I invested in a fairly large cat tree so that Scout would have more vertical space through which to enjoy in the apartment.
This was also the first time my parents were to meet Scout, and they were the first people to come over for a visit since I’d brought him home, so we weren’t quite certain how he would take to new visitors in his territory.
Very well, as it turns out.
He was quite happy to brush up against both their legs and allowed them to pet him a little bit. He’s not social exactly, but he’s certainly not shy either. Given how anxious yet bold he was in his initial explorations of our apartment, I’ve taken to describing him as brave. That’s the core of his personality. He liked my parents and my parents liked him… I couldn’t have asked for a better first impression.
After they left, Scout got a late afternoon snack and so did I (a grilled eel onigiri and a curry bun… I had bought a taiyaki too, but I decided to save it for today), after which we got to work on building his cat tree. He mainly helped by inspecting the tree at each stage of the build for structural integrity. My fluffy foreman.
If you’re wondering…. yes, the cat tree is slightly taller than I am.
Only by a few centimetres, but still. It was a challenge to secure the final level of the tree without a proper stepladder, but I got it done on tiptoes, all the while chuckling at my own shortness.
Scout was ultimately pleased, not least because he got two presents: the cat tree and the box it came in.
流石だにゃ。
He’s been surprisingly good about respecting my things and not meddling with the altar of objects in the refinished fireplace’s old hearth. He also loves walking along the mantel of the fireplace and relaxing on his twinkly purple knit blanket. Or jumping onto the bed from the other edge.
He’s still a little unsure about the structure as of this morning and never stays in the tree for long, but as he continues to interact with it and understands that it is a space just for him, I’m sure he’ll spend more time in it. It’s not visible in the photo above, but I’ve placed it right next to my desk, in the hopes that he’ll start to snooze and hang out there whenever I’m home writing (or doing whatever at my desk).
Meanwhile, I restored the second bench to my kitchen table (I’d been using it, temporarily, as a way for him to access the fireplace mantel before we got the tree), and moved his food dishes out to the side of the kitchen table beside my usual bench… so that we can still eat side by side, but we can have a guest over, too. The reading chair is in as cozy a spot as ever, but now Scout sits up on the window ledge beside me (and Whiskers’ memorial box) and, well… scouts!
Side note: he rubs my legs and twirls excitedly whenever it’s meal time, so I’ve started twirling with him and exclaiming food dance, food dance! just before I set down his food-laden dish. Because I am very cool, you know. It’s kind of reminiscent of the magic spells that they put on your meals at maid cafés. The food dance yummifies Scout’s food. We are still in the early research stages of this hypothesis. The verification process thereof is both serious and what you might call “fun”.
Anyway, halfway through the build of the cat tree I started developing a migraine, but building furniture is so damn fun I managed to push through the pain and complete it before curling up in bed and calling it a night. I gave Scout his supper before that of course, but only had enough energy to make myself a bowl of cereal and sluggishly eat it before it was lights out for me.
This morning I did some more translating; I’m working on ユクエシレズ by VOLLAND GUMP… the solo project that 沙我 released quietly under said penname back in 2015. I started translating it a while back but didn’t feel quite able to finalize it because my Japanese wasn’t at a high enough level to handle the nuances. It’s a really great song, and the tone of the music and the lyrics is really complex and beautiful. Saga’s singing soars with the heightened emotion of the lyrics, searching for meaning in the pain of reality that is laid out through the lyrics. The project’s website and youtube have recently been taken down so I can no longer link to the video that enhanced the meaning of the lyrics even more, but the lyrics themselves with the music are more than enough to give you a sense of the song’s urgent search for meaning. It’s beautiful: listen for yourself, if you haven’t before.
Other than that, I’ve been getting this blog of mine organized. I went through a very long (recent) period of intense anxiety in which I started writing a lot of blog entries (and other sorts of posts), but ultimately couldn’t bring myself to push the post button. Many of those pieces of writing remained unfinished, after having lost the nerve to continue them halfway. Some of them I’ve since deleted, some of them I may end up finishing at a later time. One post in particular, which I wrote last August about my birthday, I finally backdated and posted this morning.
To say that Social Anxiety Disorder (along with the other diagnoses that I have) has negatively impacted my life would be a massive understatement.
In November of last year, after having suffered two successive, major panic attacks in a single evening, I finally filled a prescription from my doctor and started taking medication to treat my host of mood disorders.
While the stigma surrounding mental illness has eased considerably in recent years, and eases more with every passing day in Canada at least, the culture surrounding it was very different when I was a kid. For many reasons I didn’t think I “had it bad enough” to take medication (spoiler alert: I do have it bad enough), was discouraged from taking medication from the adults in my life, was told to keep my conditions private, and was told to just think positive when I originally brought my concerns forward to an adult I trusted as a pre-teen, barely more than a child. All of those experiences sunk into me on a subconscious level.
Not to mention, said adult I trusted insisted, all the way up into adulthood, that I shouldn’t medicate.
I finally went against their cautioning and trusted my own judgement.
In the months since taking medication, I have had no major panic attacks (these generally entail hyperventilation to the point of causing chest pain for weeks afterwards), and have had only a handful of minor anxiety attacks (these generally entail racing thoughts, pounding heart, rapid breathing, crying, a sense that my life is ruined, or that I’m in danger even though I’m not… etc).
I used to have what I called a “minor” anxiety attack just about daily, sometimes multiple times a day.
That was my reality for years, my sense of normalcy.
The medication that I take has sort of taken the edge off a little, so that I’m starting to experience what it feels like to live without constant anxiety attacks and depressive episodes that leave me completely drained and unmotivated. In the months since going on medication, I have had to sort of grieve all of the time that I spent living with anxiety that could have been treated with medication. Anxiety that prevented me from doing so many things. Anxiety that kept me exhausted and confined to my bedroom.
I am an introvert and a homebody, so I naturally enjoy being at home, doing things on my own, and socializing in close-knit settings… but there is a gulf of a difference between often choosing happily to stay home, and being too terrified to go out and do things, or meet like-minded people.
Who am I without constant anxiety distorting my choices?
I grieved the life I might have lived through my teen years and twenties. I grieved the truer choices I might have made, and the abusive situations I might have avoided. I grieved my past, while also gearing up build a better future, while learning to live in the moment more… and trust my own judgement.
A tall order.
But one that I (and anyone else living with similar conditions) have the ability to fill.
I bought my maidenhair fern last year and it thrived for about a year until, for reasons I still don’t understand, it simply died. Or so I had thought. I kept sadly giving the dead fern water because I had loved the leafy plant on my windowsill so much. One day, I was astonished to see tiny green buds in the tangle of dead stems and leaves. I did some research, and sure enough, this dramatic plant has a tendency to return from the dead! I pruned away all the dead leaves, removed the planter from direct sunlight, and kept the soil moist. Finally, the biggest bud unfurled into a fuzzy little frond!
Well. The first night that I brought Scout home, I went to bed and woke up in the middle of the night to a bit of a commotion going on in the kitchen. Sure enough, that little scoundrel had decided to prune the leaves off of not one but two of my plants. One of which was my poor little fern.
I despaired.
I laughed.
I sighed at the wheatgrass that I had started growing for Scout just a day earlier, not yet tall enough for him to eat.
Despite the interruption into the fern’s cycle of regrowth, though, it has continued, and is now a tiny collection of fuzzy little fronds. Not one of which Scout has decided to prune. He’s too busy enjoying his patch of wheatgrass on the living room window sill… success.
Scout and the maidenhair fern are not so dissimilar, actually.
When I was setting up the adoption appointment for him over the phone, the counsellor told me a little about his history (specific details for which had not been available on their website); that’s how I knew I was about to adopt the right cat. He was a stray that someone had found nearly frozen in a snowbank this past winter. No previous owner had come looking for him during his treatment and fostering period, so it is likely that he had been an outdoor or farm cat, perhaps regularly going to eat on some kind human(s) porch(es) and otherwise fending for himself. He isn’t feral, as he seems very comfortable around and friendly towards humans, though some “normal” household things have completely perplexed him (like mirrors, filled bathtubs, and water faucets). But for whatever reason, through a stroke of luck, he survived his near-death experience and bounced back with the help of the humans who found him.
I wanted to call him Phoenix or Ghost because of that story, but Scout fit his personality much better.
I’m just so happy I get to be his human and keep him warm.
Thank you for choosing me, Scout, my sweet boy.