Lessons from an old cat

Kiwi came to us as a rescue cat, taken from her mother before she was ready to be weened, we saw her at the vet still with her litter-mates. She was the only one who looked her in the eye and meowed, the others hissed. The vet said that she'd be a small cat, and she came home with us that day.

As she grew up, she imprinted on Alicia Star as the mommy cat. She tried to nurse from Alicia Star even as she was bigger than Alicia Star! Alicia was the roshi of the cat brood, indeed the roshi of 7 Myrtle Avenue. Alicia accecpted Kiwi as her pal and companion though her cat son Alex remained her favorite.

During the years at Myrtle Avenue, Kiwi grew to be a 20+lb cat who loved to eat, loved to be in the bamboo garden sleeping in the sun, and who was loyal to me through thick and thin. She wasn't the favorite, and she always wanted approval from the senior cats.

Kiwi would follow me as I walked along the railroad tracks behind the stream at Myrtle Street, lagging a bit behind Alex and Alicia Star, but always wanting to be part of the pack. While the others walked with me on the railroad rail, she'd be content to walk along the railroad ties with us. Sometimes I'd carry her across the stream, sometimes we'd "ditch her" and leave her to figure how to cross on her own. Her great girth limited her atheletic prowess and I never guessed that she'd become the 6 1/2 lb fragile being with a big heart that she is today.

As arthritus fused her lower spine, her ability to get around became more and more limited. Her colon stopped processing properly and she had some incidents where she became impacted and needed vet intervention to continue living. We started her on stool softener, lactulose drops twice a day. This worked for a while.


Then the vet discovered that her kidneys were failing. We started giving her fluids every now and then as supportive therapy. Didn't expect her to live long, but since she was still interested and such a wonderful companion, I gave her a spot on the floor and kept up her daily therapy.

It took me too long to realize that she needed a heating pad, but I bought her a big one ( large enough for Carol and Kiwi to be on it together) and set her up with an incondesent lightbulb over her for radient heat.

The wonderful vet Bill Eshthimer told me that Kiwi needed supplimental fluids via needle under the skin a few times a week. I had given fluids to cats before, and while it's important therapy, in the past it always signaled end of life approaching. I started giving Kiwi fluids, even though my technique was poor.

Unlike most cats, Kiwi allowed me to give her fluids despite my clumsyness with the needle, and patiently waited for the process to complete most times. Her docile nature served her well and I improved with practice. Dr. Bill helped me to learn sterile technique and patiently tutored me in how to insert the needle properly. As I gained in skill, the pain inflicted on the cat diminished, and it got easier to be regular.

She became incontenent, so I gave her fresh bedding twice or three times a day, washing her towels a few times a week. She had some more crises with blockages, and a stand in vet suggested a diet change that really helped her to be back on regular with her digestion.


Her inability to move around has made keeping her clean tough, but she still relates to Carol and wakes me every morning with a squak and a purrr. Kiwi wakes me every morning with her squalk-meow just before the alarm is to go off at 5am. I change her bedding, feed her and give her fluids every other morning.

The yoga of service work, the zen of practice in this tiny corner of the room has been a blessing for me. In one way, the question is should I be doing for a human instead of an "animal"? The answer that I've found is that for me this is the practice that calls me now, knowing that it won't go on indefinately, knowing that it won't end well, but taking each moment together as a gift.

So while I thought that this was a kitty hospice commitment that would last a few weeks, it's turned out to be a blessing that has continued for a couple years now. I'm so grateful for the time with her, and while it's been difficult for both of us, her good attitude and appreciation for what we do for her is both a reward and a lesson.

I used to think that you should "put down" ( kill) a cat with such limitations but when the standard is "are they in pain?" and do they still want to live?, the answer is quite different. The effort is sometimes taxing, but the reward is subtle and lesson one that only unfolds over time.

The service to this small being brings me joy, and wonder. How is it that our love can be sustained through such trials? This small being has such a big heart, and it's a small thing to be able to repay her for the years that she nourished my spirit, for the times that I was too harsh, for the times that I ignored her simple needs. Yet the mystery of life isn't revealed, but the benefits are unrolling as we breathe. Precious being, thanks for this morning, thanks for this day and the time with Sharon, Kiwi, Carol and Snowy.

Time to go to work to earn the money to support this tribe.

Thanks

Now that the housing bubble has burst, real estate prices are plunging, bank credit is evaporating, and the economic contraction is like a spasm, the void in our economy is acting like a shock wave.

Funding of the war hasn't been from new taxes, rather it has come from a combination of taxes on the increased economic activity revolving around the extraction of equity from the real estate that has occured during the interest rate decline of the last few years, and from shifting government resources from domestic progams into war related expenses. Because new taxes have been minimal, the resources invested in public capital like basic research,;human health; environmental protection; infrastructure renewal; NASA; consumer protection have declined.

The interaction of policy with this extraction of public capital has been particularly stupid with respect to basic research. The restrictions on visas cut the supply of intellectual talent that came to the US for study at the same time as much basic research support was cut by the federal government. This at a time when our international competitors are compeating for the brightest minds on the global stage. One result is that China and India are on the way to becomming research powerhouses. Increasing investment and encouraging research involvement by foreign graduates at US Universities and national labs is an obvious high leverage shift that should be implemented immediately.

Some applied research area's should be funded at a higher level, with my favorites being plasma physics, atmosperic research, agricultural research, species conservation, flywheel battery storage, alternative energy, bio fuels and sustainable production, energy conservation, ecosystem conservation, extending our network capital investment, research infrastructure support.

Unfortunately now that the resources are squandered and the common capital depleated, our options narrow. It's a shame to have wasted the last 17 years in the greenhouse warming cycle, but it would be criminal to squander the next 17.

I strongly support the defense of my country, and believe that the best national security policy must balance the investment in the domestic infrastructure with the funding of overseas power exercises. We must be skillful in how we strike the balance, and our national command authority could do better, must do better.
Overextending to try to right a policy ship that is listing to port and has lost headway drains our precious capital, yet there are basic military realities that we must support over the long term.

There are some simple policy choices that could vastly improve our nation and would improve our security. One of the first things we must change is our care of veterans: it is a national disgrace that veterans health care is in crises, ignores so much battle trauma. Funding childrens medical and health care is another no-brainer. Credible elections would be another, reform of our sentencing laws and practices is another. Now that much of the mechanism has been dismantled, some agencies would take time to reconstitute, so the sooner we start the better.

Such measures will reduce dispair, and improve the cohesiveness of our society. Improving our research institutions and reducing the ideological management of research could improve our economy. Improving our energy efficiency and energy distribution systems could also improve our national security.

The present administration has an ideological agenda that opposes development of public capital, favors only increased corporate capital and control. I hope that extending the war will be rethought, and more creative and realistic planners be given a voice. I hope that the administration will listen a bit more, though there isn't much basis for optimism.

Still, the connectivity and collective intelligence that emerges as the web develops is an agent of change beyond government imagination. New opportunities, and new vulnerabilities. We need to think about how to guard the freedom of the network, universal access, and so on. It needs to be codified into law or the web will loose it's extra edge in synergizing the colletive exercise of intellegence.