We said goodbye to Teller this evening. Monday’s X-rays showed a blockage narrowing his trachea to the size of a stirring straw. He spent much of yesterday in the basement, in a back corner away from the light, trying to get comfortable while fighting to breathe. At midnight, I carried him upstairs and placed him gently on the end of our bed, but after a while he hopped down and laid next to the bed until morning, wheezing softly.
He would compress himself into the smallest ball possible on my lap and pass out for hours, and I would stroke his soft fur and feel my blood pressure sink to the single digits. I got home from work this afternoon, found him, and gently sat him on my lap, careful not to compress his windpipe. We stayed like that for about five minutes, and he purred involuntarily when he could draw a full breath, but it got to be too much and he hopped down to recover in the other room.
I will miss his odd meow, his soft, downy fur, his comforting heat and bulk on drafty winter afternoons, and his atrocious breath. Most of all, I will miss his beautiful green eyes, imploring me to pick him up, rub behind his ears, and curl him up in the crook of my arm for a long nap.
Teller is at the vet today, and the news isn’t good. He has a growth of some kind in the back of his throat, which accounts for all the wheezing he’s been doing lately. That’s the good news (that we know what it is). The bad news is that the vet is doubtful we’ll be able to do much for him other than pain management, although she’s going to try a steroid shot to bring the swelling down. We’ll have to do some kind of a consult with a veterinary surgeon to know if there are any options, but she’s not getting my hopes up. It’s hard to imagine life without his warm fur, constant purr, or sharp claws when he gets into his happy place (he kneads with his claws involuntarily, which is sweet but painful). We’ve always joked about life without cats, but I didn’t think it would be this soon–and the house will be much quieter with only the stupid one skulking around.
Update: Bad, bad news. We’re throwing a hail mary pass with steroids, but the prognosis is bleak.
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There’s nothing more satisfying than using a 10-year-old computer to do an important job. I’ve got our old Powerbook G4 here at work crunching fonts from a handful of file formats into OpenType files that we can use anywhere. I’d converted a pile of them a few years go but stopped when the machine I was working on (a twitchy G5 tower) started bombing during processing. The G4 has been chugging along happily for a few hours now, and even though it’s running very hot it hasn’t complained yet. Perhaps I can get all of these legacy files finished and put to bed once and for all.
It’s becoming clear to me now that I can’t drink coffee after, say, noon anymore. Yesterday I ate a sandwich accompanied by some healthy carrots and hummus for lunch, and immediately fell into a three-hour carb coma. Afraid of passing out, I bought an overpriced cup of coffee and sipped on it until 4:30; this had me staring at the ceiling until 2AM this morning. This makes the 22-year-old in me sad.
Lousy week.
Brian Lam, of the Wirecutter, wrote an article that sums up a lot of what I’ve been thinking about for the last six months or so, but haven’t been able to put into words. Using a quote from, of all people, Ted Kaczynski, he illustrates a great point:
Technology lets us do things faster and more efficiently; why would we use that newfound free time to do more and more of the same old thing? I’m not just talking about smarter consumption of content like Johnson is– I’m also saying, fuck consumption.
I spend about two hours each night on the bed looking at my laptop before I go to sleep. Sometimes I’m watching TV and looking at the computer, sometimes I’m switching to my phone. And the whole time, I’m wishing I was doing something else–I spend eight hours a day looking at a computer, why the hell am I doing it when I get home?
So I’ve started a list of things—small things—that I can accomplish with the 1-2 hours of free time I have after Finn goes to bed. Things like spending non-TV time with my wife, reading, doing self-assigned illustration projects, cleaning my workbench, untangling the nest of wiring in the basement, (when the weather warms up) maintenance on the cars, etc. With each one of these things there are ancillary tasks that must be accomplished before I can begin, and those will be part of the list. I’m going to try and close the laptop when I get home and leave it until I get to work the next morning, unless I’m using it to create, not consume.
Addendum: I read this article abut the top five regrets of the dying, and I’m going to try and use it as a roadmap for the time I’d like to reclaim.
I woke early this morning to the sound of Finn using the bathroom, and when she was done she crashed on the bed next to me. When we finally began rousing ourselves, she complained of a headache. She was running a fever, so I installed her on the couch in front of Nick Jr. and Mama made her some juice to drink.
This week has been a blur of sleep-work-home-sleep with no productive outcome. I spent about 3/4 of my work week in Photoshop compositing images for a client but we haven’t sold a concept yet. I broke up a three-week Scout drought for Wednesday’s commute, and was rewarded by a minor fender bender on the 395 onramp.
The keg of Dead Ringer IPA in the kegerator still hasn’t carbonated fully; there’s a hint of fizz in there, but not as much as I’d like. I have plans to brew with my neighbor tomorrow afternoon—he has two batches fermenting and a third to brew, as well as a propane-fired stove in his garage. He’s also my A/V expert, being an electrician by trade, so I’m going to finalize my television mounting plan with him.
I’m trying to motivate myself to start shooting pictures again. My commute has been a predictable figure-8 for the past three years, and as a result I don’t see new things for inspiration. The solution could be adding an extra ten minutes to my morning commute to find new routes into work, as well as more trips out with the girls to explore. I’m also considering the purchase of some 120 film to roll onto 620 spools so that I can shoot some black and white pictures of the girls.
I was plugged into my headphones at work when I felt the first rumble, and at first I thought it was just another big truck driving by on Redwood Street. The rumble went on for too long and was too severe to be a truck, and just as I was pulling my headphones off, my coworkers were asking what was happening. We all started saying Earthquake at about the same time, and that was right as the first wave passed. Then, the second, more powerful one hit, and I felt the floor start moving in ripples underneath my feet. Another coworker came tearing down from upstairs, yelling, “Get out of the building!” and we all jumped from our desks like we’d been shot out of a cannon. Feet down pounding the stairs, outside to the street, where other people emptied out of their buildings and stood around gaping at the sky like us. Sirens wailed across the city. People stared into their cellphones and texted frantically. I’d left my phone, wallet, and keys on the desk upstairs, so I stood around feeling stupid until we decided the coast was clear, then went back upstairs to an “all circuits are busy” message and the magic of the Internet to confirm my girls were OK.
I’m writing this in bed with a cold beer on the nightstand next to me. Jen is downstairs working and the girl is next door, fast asleep after a long day.
We’ve had two very busy days, each ending in late bedtime. Friday Jen and I picked the girl up from daycare and drove to our friends’ house for a lovely backyard barbecue, with excellent food and conversation among the music of crickets and cicada. Finn fearlessly climbed the treehouse ladder and called to me quietly for help when it was time to come down; I must have climbed that ladder for her five times, happy to see she’d made it up there on her own with no complaint (I’d say it was a full story high). Late in the evening, as dusk gave way to shadow, after accompanying her to the bathroom, I followed her back out of the house, smiling wide as she bound fearlessly into the dark ahead of me looking for adventure.
Saturday morning I brought her shopping with me, and in the car we had a long talk about throwing fits when she didn’t get her way. She knew there was a pool party planned and I made it clear that she needed to behave if she wanted to go. She did really well sticking with me in the Target, Old Navy, and finally the Kohl’s, where she got close to a meltdown after running off on her own. I took her to a quiet corner and reviewed the rules, and we came to an agreement after some deep breaths and discussion. From there, we picked up groceries and headed home.
After naptime, I packed her up with a fresh bowl of guacamole and a bag of beach gear and we drove out into a light drizzle to a pool party thrown by my boss; a little downpour didn’t spoil the fun, so we all just stayed inside. Finn’s already met almost everyone there, but it wasn’t until she’d had some food that she finally warmed up to the crowd. And then, there was no stopping her. Four hours later, at the time she’s usually putting head to pillow, she was blowing kisses and making the rounds, charming everyone she touched. There was no drama, no screaming; the worst point was when I had to wave off the third cupcake, and then have a quick chat to remind her of our agreement (a clean plate of real food first and then dessert). All afternoon I kept a close eye on her from afar, and everything I saw looked good—let’s just say I didn’t have to go running to correct anything the entire visit.
We talked about our day and sang to each other on the way home (Eyes Without a Face, She Drives Me Crazy, and I Love Rock ‘N’ Roll were standouts), and when she went down for sleep, she stayed down. I’ll take another fifteen years of days like that, thank you very much.
This morning I said goodbye to my old MacBook Pro, the 17″ workhorse that got me through three years of freelance and the beginning of my current job. I’d had it on Craigslist for the last month or so, gradually lowering the price by $50 each week, but it wasn’t until yesterday that I got a solid offer. Walking away I had a twinge of regret and a fear that I’d sold it for too little, but had to remind myself that cash in the pocket is worth more than an unused computer on the desk.
Meanwhile, my Moleskine notebook and sunglasses have gone missing somewhere in the house ever since I got back from Bennett’s place this weekend. I’ve grown accustomed to carrying my notebook with me everywhere I went, writing notes down for myself (it’s little more than a reminder/planner, but for my attention span, the perfect size and shape) so I’m feeling a huge hole in my conscious brain every five minutes, when I think of something else to do, check on, or remind myself of. I’ve had it for about two weeks shy of a year, so the habit is strong. I tore the house upside down last night looking for it, but it wasn’t until this morning when I realized my sunglasses are gone too—this is a good thing, because it means both things made it back inside after my trip on Saturday, so they must be someplace inside the house. The question remains: where?
Sometimes people ask me about how I created my….
As someone who struggles every day with getting my design/carpentry/mechanics/parenting/husbandry to be where my ambitions lie, this is the best bit of advice I could read.