A Little Bit of Faith

"Summertime and the livin' is easy"

Meowmie has been singing that song a lot lately. I keep waiting for what the next lyric promises but so far no fish are jumpin' around here that I can find, and the cotton isn't high but the next door neighbor's grass sure is, and that is my favorite destination when my back door opens and I get to frolic in this glorious season called summer. I have plenty of company as Sandy, Sabrina, Mickey, Butterscotch and Pretty all join me in a feast of tender greens. Meowmie says we look like a herd of cows grazing next door where the grass is always greener, don't ya know. It's a good thing that the neighbor is a cat-friendly human with several of her own. She never chases us away.

After a good chomp I like to settle into the neighbor's flowers for a little snooze, while Sabrina explores smells with a frenzy and Mickey scares herself and runs back to our yard and waits at the door to dash back in. Butterscotch has his friends from the feral colony to smurgle with and finds himself a cozy spot to lay with them among the back hedges, away from the burning sun. Pretty, my sisfur, waddles slowly back to our own yard and hunts for a good plopping space while Sandy finds new ways to get in trouble. Sandy is a juvenile delinquent mom says. She is totally fearless and full of wanderlust which means she gets yelled at a lot by mom. Once the humans found her trapped in a strange yard up the street and lately she insists on exploring yards several fences over from ours. Boy, if the humans who live there still had their huge doggy, she would be a chew toy by now, but he went to Rainbow Bridge not long ago. Sandy knows she is in trouble by mom's tone and runs straight for the back door when she gets caught trespassing.

Still, Sandy should know that she is making it hard on all of us by her antics because now we have to stay penned in our yard if she goes out, and that is so boring!

My other housemates, Mandy and Sally, don't get to go out and enjoy summer. Well, Mandy could if she wanted to, but she is totally weird and doesn't like to go out. Sally wants out with a passion but the humans don't allow it because Sally gets freaky outside and hides for hours and hours, making the humans frantic until they get her back inside. She escaped 3 times over the years and each time was a major stress. She does get to sit in the screened window and watch us and mom does pick what she calls "Sally grass" for her, which the pampered calico gobbles with glee.

After a nice nap, I used to love to meander over to the yard on the opposite side of ours to our other next door neighbor. A doggy lives there but he is wimpy and never out much. From there I would run up the steps outside that lead to a back door on the neighbor's second floor and make the short leap over to our flat roof. I could sit for hours up there, undisturbed, surveying the entire neighborhood. When I was ready to come back inside, mom would just open an upstairs window and I'd hop on inside. Did you notice I said "used to"? That was during the good ole days before the humans got a shiny new metal roof last summer. I tried it a few times and would have made a dandy poster for the play, "Cat On A Hot Tin Roof". Ouch!

Still, I have the grass, the flowers, a warm breeze in my fur and bird song in my ears. I guess the livin' really is easy.

Purrs, Faith Marie

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