While changing feed readers today I had to decide how to categorize various blogs. I noticed how often a religious or spiritual blog could also be classified as a political one. I find that surprising on one hand and inevitable on the other. Surprising because when I belonged to a church for a few years in the late 70s we seldom spoke of politics in relation to religion. The blending of the two was discouraged at that time. Yet some merging of religion and politics seems inevitable today. It’s impossible to discuss one without someone mentioning the other. (more…)

After I wakened Barbara this morning (a job in itself, let me tell you) it took me an hour or so longer to get her to understand I wanted to go outside. I suppose it’s understandable, since I hardly ever go out anymore, now that I’m retired, but this was the first day of spring weather. How could she fail to see that? It was warm, sunny, and the air was clear from the recent rain. M-m-meooowilicious.

She finally let me out, along with the dog, and I sat on the back porch for a glorious hour or so. I even thought about chasing a lizard, that’s how good it felt. But I decided to leave them for the younger cats in the neighborhood. They need the practice.

So don’t let Barbara continue her “it’s not spring yet” whining. It is spring. She just needed to wait another two days for the weather to change. Patience is a virtue, my dear humans.

I still hope they turn the heater on tonight. But I wouldn’t mind the heat on in the middle of summer, now that I think of it. We cats are desert creatures, you know. Actually I prefer to think of us as Mediterranean.

Meow! (That’s cat for ciao, you know.)

Love,
Emily the cat

P. S. I’m hungry. Is there Italian sausage on that pizza?

Tomorrow is the vernal equinox, and that’s a little hard for me to believe right now. We’re used to getting May Gray and June Gloom here near the coast of Southern California, because of the coastal eddies. But this winter has hit us harder and later than usual. It doesn’t appear to want to leave yet. There was snow in the mountains just last week. Up the street, someone’s irises started to bloom a few days ago, but they shriveled over one cold night. Now they prepare to bloom again. Will they?

The cat still scrunches up against the wall heater each morning and evening, and she chases patches of sunlight coming in the windows during the day. A couple of days ago I watched her pat a bright spot on the carpet with a paw, then lie down on it, fur fluffed out. She’s an older cat, so perhaps she dramatizes the situation. Maybe I do, too. But this doesn’t feel like the day before spring to me. Not at all. We had a cold rain late in the day, with the clouds parting toward sunset. Maybe tomorrow will convince me. How’s the weather in your part of the world?

A recent Washington Post column queried Bloggers on the Reasons Behind Their Daily Words. Reading it got me to thinking yet again about why I blog.

I started my website back in 2000, when Shadows Fall was first published, for the same reason most writers do, to promote my work. Four years later I started this blog as a way to provide up-to-date content on my website and let visitors know what I was working on—basically as a way to keep the website from stagnating when too much time passed between novels. Little did I know at the time that the blog would engage so much of my attention.

The immediacy of this format holds a certain attraction. Type, click a button, and what you’ve written is published. But that has its drawbacks. As easy as email, which carries its own risks, a blog can suck you out into public view in a way that’s scary and in some ways deceiving. It’s easy to forget you’re putting yourself “out there” to the degree we do online. After all, I’m seated here alone at my home computer as I type this into a little window on my screen. It doesn’t feel public at all, at the time I write. (more…)

Last night my dad’s house burned down. It was there at seven-thirty in the evening. By eight-thirty it was gone. Destroyed in 39 minutes. No one saw this coming. No one’s sure what caused the fire, at this point. It appears to have started in a bathroom.

All five people who were in the house got out okay, with only their clothes—or in my dad’s case his pajamas—on their backs.

Life is strange, how it plods along, and then—poof!—a puff of smoke and a pile of charcoal is all that’s left of everything you own, as if it was a cruel illusion—which I suppose it is. Physical things create an illusion of permanence in an impermanent life. Love is all that lasts.

I’m still in shock, and I wasn’t even there. (more…)

Thanks to the folks at A9.com, Inc. you can now explore my home town, San Diego, on your computer by virtual map. Cool, huh? See if your city is listed here, or search for a specific street address on the same page.
(more…)