Akron's Early Morning Bird Song

There's more to report on the Gulf, which I will do later, but first some thoughts from Akron Ohio, my home town.

We got into Akron at 1:30 Monday  morning.  I had spent the day with Kathy Westwater at the Fresh Kills Landfill (more about this later as well).  We were in bed by 2:30.  The birds began singing at 2:45 and Bessie flashed in my mind.

Bessie was my father's cat.  She came to live with me a couple years before Virgil passed because he couldn't care for her adequately.  She needed dental work and grooming (after my father died she had a small stroke which Dr. Karen Komisar, the amazing homeopathic vet, remedied). But between dental work and stroke we traveled to Akron to help take care of Virgil.

Every night, about midnight or so, I would prepare for bed.  I was sleeping in my father's TV room on an Aero bed.  Everynight I would re-inflate it.  Bessie would help, hurling herself from corner to corner as the little blower pumped air into the plastic baffles.  I would put on sheets and a blanket and then pass out.  Bessie would lay next to me until the bird song started.  She was a tiny thing but could launch herself from the mattress with enough force to wake me.  She would then begin her daily dialogue of threat and menace at the screened window facing our old backyard.  The bird song was loud, abundant as the singers completely ignored the little furball.

I was happy to wake to their singing this morning.  And since I can't seem to find an obituary to her, let this serve as a tribute to Bessie the birder and companion cat.