On the downside, Forest and I both slept TERRIBLY last night, thanks to Leeloo, who was howling for a man-cat all night. I swear to god, at one point she was actually shrieking "fuck me, fuck meeeeeee!!!!" at the top of her feline range. I am getting her spayed as soon as we get back from our trip. I'm considering getting her declawed, too. Try as we might, we have not been able to train her to stop ripping up our carpet, our couch, and oddly enough she has been digging her claws into our wooden panelling, too. She never goes outside, so I don't have to worry about her defending herself. To the contrary, we're getting another cat Leeloo's age from my sister this summer. This cat's name is Precious (don't ask me, I have no idea), and Precious is already spayed and declawed. It doesn't seem fair to me to have Leeloo running around with her Freddie Kruger-style, razor-sharp claws, and introduce defenseless Precious to the situation. It reminds me of the Romans tossing people to the lions. Not a good scenario.
I don't like the name 'Precious' for a cat, but I guess Laura promised some little kids when she got her as a kitten that her name would never be changed. So there it is. Forest likes it, because he can limp around, make googly-faces and do his Golem impression, lisping "Precious, my precious" in whispery, half-insane tones. He's so cute.
And upset. His family's situation is really bringing him down. He's close to his dad, and feels like his mom's going to take vindictive action out of anger in her divorce case. Forest doesn't react well to unfairness of any kind, and he's already biased against the court system because his brother got screwed repeatedly on child support issues. This just piles up to make him pretty sad about the whole thing, and he'll be really angry with his mom if she goes too far. It's already a really ugly situation. I think he'd be best off sitting down and giving his mom a very rational opinion. "Mom, I love you, and I understand that you're angry and hurt; but please don't do this to my dad."
That sort of thing presents her with the fact that she's hurting her kids, not just her husband with this petty sort of behavior. It also validates her feelings, which I think is something she is craving right now, and reinforces the idea that Forest isn't taking sides; he's just pointing out his feelings on the subject.
He's so upset that he wants to say things like "Mom, if you do that, you won't have a son anymore." I worry about that, because she'll perceive it as a threat (which it is) and won't see past the threat to see the feelings behind it. Gosh, I can't wait until this is over, and I'm not even in on half of the ugliness. Yuck.
But I'm not going to let that keep him down all week while we're away. A nice quiet drive with some good music will be nice. We'll snuggle into our sleeping bags late in the night and use our flashlights to read a good book, too. That always makes my honey happy. By the time we've had a good breakfast (he loves cereal) and a nice hot shower, he will be feeling a lot better, I think.
Since he's working all day and then closing the Store, it falls to me to get us both packed. I don't mind, though. I am Virgo enough that I enjoy packing, and pride myself on doing a good job. I'm not as bad as Jack Nicholson in "As Good As It Gets", but I'm embarrassingly close. For this trip I get the luxury of overpacking, too. I'll take the seats out of the van and go to town. It's better safe than sorry, I figure. Actually, now that I think of it, I think we will be limited on how much stuff we can take over to the Island by the people who run the ferry over there. Hmm. A challenge! I like those.
I also get to run around and buy things, which is fun, too; film, batteries, roadsnacks, and that sort of stuff. I think I'm going to pick up a book for Forest, too. I wish I'd been able to save up more money for the trip, but we're not in terrible shape. We won't be dining at the Grand Hotel, I grant you, but we won't have to stick solely to PB&J either.
Oddly, I'm too excited to focus enough to write much more. See you next week!
