Smidgen's Wishes

I may have to change the name of this blog to "Take Two and Don't Call Me" because I'm almost too busy to breathe. One little person in my life has the capacity to bring me to a screeching halt in the here and now though and that is Smidgen. You may remember her from this summer when she arrived at our house a flea bitten handful of fur. She's not a baby anymore but she is still just a little kitty. She is very very talkative. When she enters a room she announces herself with a little trill of M and R sounds. When she is being ignored and prefers not to be she chatters like a mad bird. When she is being transported against her will away from a tempting plant or other trouble she sounds like a very small fire engine. She is also very articulate non-verbally. She will lick you raw when she is content. And, she will push her box of kitten food over to you and bump your toes with it if she needs to make a point.

She is the most intensely here and now when I am trying to knit. She understands that she is not allowed to play with my knitting. She learned this through repeated lessons involving chasing, running, yelling and being jiggled until the forbidden ball of yarn dropped from her jaws. Nevertheless she loves to sit on my lap and gaze longingly at my project. The flicking arrangement of needles in my hands, the long wiggly piece of yarn that disappears tantalizingly into my knitting bag, the delectable ball of yarn that makes sudden and delightful appearances are equally fascinating to her. She stares long and hard until she is entranced into a dreaming pile of furry feet and ears.

She has made peace with the other resident animals. She and Dogzilla engage in playful run and chase games and when they wear themselves out she tries to bathe him. Princess deigns to recognize that Smidgen is useful as a Class A Food Mooch and happily shares the kitten food Smidgen wrings out of her hapless people. Killer, while lethal to rodents and birds, is essentially a pacifist and allows Smidgen to run hog over him. He prefers to observe from a distance like the fur-bearing anthropologist I've always suspected him of being. So Smidgen is a happy little thing but if she could wish for anything at all I believe it would be some knitting of her own and someone smaller than her to boss around.