A Beautiful Mess

Have you ever tried to type on a laptop with a 17 pound cat draped over your hands? The time when I sneak away to post to this neglected blog, Sakura finds me, jumps on the bad, and crawls in my lap. Resume the petting, please. Another one in the herd, Marimba, has taken refuge on the bed. The other three felines are downstairs, probably taking residence on the couch or out on the porch. Meanwhile, Steve is sitting on the floor, grading.

Sakura settles for snuggling on my left arm, her polydactyl paw gently resting on my hand. She lays her head on my shoulder and occasionally bats at the moving fingers on the keyboard. I’m still here. Then Sakura yawns and lays her head down on my arm, purring like the proverbial motor. Soon, she settles down at the end of the bed, her pinkish ears twitching at the sounds of birds or at the barking of Mitzy, the next door neighbor’s black and white dog who guards her property a little too well.

I look outside. There’s a break in the monsoon season. (I’m only half-joking.) We had so much rain—I wish we would ship it off to Alaska and California to put out those wildfires. The rain has made the memory garden grow. It has taken off and taken over. It’s been a joy to watch the roses return after a year of absent blooms. The Asiatic lilies and the daylilies are blooming; welcoming the month of July with a flashing display of colors in the yard. We have all but given up pruning the flowers until the season is over. It is an informal cottage garden anyway; a beautiful mess.