This past October I was sitting at a red light, near my doctor’s office, which I had just left. When our car was rear-ended. I was told by the police officer my car was drivable. It wasn’t. Oh, I made it home all right. Then it fell apart like a cartoon character. It was declared totalled by my insurance company, the frame looked like and accordion. I was told we were lucky.

Lots of pain, lots more physical troubles. Our savings for taxes went into the buying a used, 100,000-mile new car, new to us car.

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I tend to growl a lot like my  American shorthair cat, Sanosuki.  We call him Sano or Suki,  he grumbles and hides in the closet. If he would let me I would be in there with him.

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I hope that all of you are well, happy- alive and breathing. Please put down your cell phones when you drive. Turn the insane things off. Notice the cars around you. Watch the trees, animals, people and all the fun things you will miss by being electronically connected. Check out the odd things people do in their cars when they think no one is watching.

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This morning I decided to feed the birds off the deck, right outside the kitchen doors. There was one major problem. The ice, rain, sleet, snow that fell on December 30…froze solid. I couldn’t open the door.

No, problem, right. I pulled on my boots, heavy coat, hat, gloves and muffler and walked outside like some two-year-old, stuck under a mountain of clothes. I was  barely able to move my arms. I had the bread and birdseed wrapped in a piece of paper towel and carefully place in my side pocket. I grabbed my old ski poles and walked into the cold.

The blast of air that hit me had me ready to go back inside. (16 degrees Fahrenheit/ -8 degrees Celsius)

The sun was out and the air was clear and fresh. The snow was white, shining crystals of blue-grey and white. The taller grasses and wild foliage poked up a dried, frozen brown -beige, out of the layer of ice and snow. As I walked I didn’t crunch through the ice, I walked on top.

The deck was covered with three inches of ice and snow. I noticed something odd, the snow didn’t lie flat on the deck it was rounded. When I stepped on it I didn’t have a strong foothold. I had to slowly move up the deck holding tightly to the rail. This time, I was a child learning to walk hand over hand, unsteady worried about gravity.  I never made it up to the kitchen door. I couldn’t move the frozen snow/ice off the steps. It was as if the snow, ice and wooden deck  ‘were one’ and that was a force I didn’t want to slide on.

I removed the birdseed and shredded bread from my pocket.  Reached through the slats placing it carefully on the rounded- sloped mound of ice.

From inside the house, my cats were waiting impatiently for the birds. They didn’t have to wait long. Sanosuki chirped, mewed, purred as he ran up and down the cat tower, excited and hopeful that one bird would come inside. He sat and watched as the bread and seed disappear.