Tripping Down Memory Lane

 So, yesterday I cleaned the carport and threw away trash. It always annoys my husband, Drew when I get stuff for free off of marketplace. He says things like: "We already have enough junk." and "What will you do with it?" He lacks creativity! And IT IS FREE!

I end up using most everything I acquire and making something useful. Instead of seeing what we might have on hand that might work for a project, he just hops in his truck and comes back with new materials. Never the correct amount and never buying everything in one trip. This makes me a little crazy.

Now that the carport is neat and tidy, I wonder how long it will be before I will be faced with doing it again. I also wonder what the feral cats will think when they show up for their evening meal. He has named them, so I would think that means they are pets. He buys cat food in the biggest size available and keeps it stored in the back of his truck.

We have a large trash can with a good lid we keep dogfood in on the porch. In our recent absence the cats tore a hole in the lid of the trashcan and had pulled part of the bag inside the trashcan through the lid! I will be purchasing a metal can for the dogfood.

He has three cats that show up to eat while he is still outside and can see them. There is a nice yellow tomcat he named Garfield, and a pure white one he calls Snowball. The other cat is tortoise colored and only shows up occasionally. He did not name that one. Garfield is becoming tamer and will let himself be petted and picked up. Snowball will come to eat, but she (who knows if it is a boy or girl?) is still skittish. She is very small and reminds me of the Siamese cat we had while the kids were growing up. 

Her name was Misty. She was a pretty little kitten at a house we were looking at to buy. Before I could stop things from happening the owner had gifted the kitten to my kids! This is when we decided it was worth the price of a sitter to not take the kids along while we hunted for a house!

Misty was just a tiny kitten when she came to live with us. My youngest child, Adrienne, was the only one not in school at this time. She carried the cat around all day, dressed in Barbie doll clothes. Misty was a gentle soul and succumbed to Adrienne's wishes without a fight. She never got very big, so when Misty had a litter of silky little kittens, it was a big surprise. She had a little yellow striped male kitten that Adrienne decided would not be given away and Adrienne's mother succumbed to the child's wishes with just a little argument.

Adrienne made this kitten wear Ken's clothes and I recall the cat in a Barbie mobile driving through the house. She named him Southy. Yes, autocorrect, I did spell that right! No one questioned 4-year-old Adrienne about her reasoning on the name choice. She was a force to be reckoned with, even at that tender age.

Southy grew larger than his mother, Misty. He was not as compliant as Misty and would often leave claw marks on his owner. She would cry and get band aids and go right back to terrorizing the cat. One day Southy took off and never came back. Misty stayed and was still alive when we moved to Minnesota. She was never an inside cat; she lived in the garage. One day she did not come home. She did live a long life, and Adrienne finally grew out of dressing her. 

A little trip down memory lane .....