In today’s mail, there was a card from our vet’s office. I rather expected receiving something like that, but I didn’t expect what was inside. Personal messages from our vet and members of his staff - and everyone signed it. And inside was the story of the Rainbow Bridge that Jane mentioned in her comment the other day. I hadn’t known what she was talking about then. I do now and it’s beautiful.

I wanted to thank each of you who has given me kind words and/or hugs (and/or oatmeal chocolate chip cookies). As I just mentioned in an email, I’m still crying but my tears now contain more gratitude than pain.

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I thought that making the decision to have my 12-year old cat put to sleep was hard. I thought the hardest part would be following through with it. I thought if I just got through it, my spontaneous bursts into tears would end.

I was wrong.

The first night wasn’t bad. Alcohol and the company of friends helped. What started as a way for The Boyfriend and I to forget what we’d just been through (yes, he stayed with Mickey and me through the end) ended up being a good evening with good people who made us laugh. And as weird as this is to say, I have a whole new appreciation for The Boyfriend now, because he gets me. He gets how I deal with things, which is to say that he doesn’t judge me for the twisted comments I make when I’m hurting. So, that was the first night.

The second day was horrible. I had to work. Correction: I had to show up at work and pretty much stand around uselessly. Fortunately, nearly everyone I work with is an animal lover and there was considerable understanding. Which is good, because I cried in the shower, I cried while I was getting ready for work, I cried in the car on the way to work and I cried as soon as I saw TOTO once I got to work. And the rest of the night was a series of crying bursts. And then I cried myself to sleep.

The third day was a little better. I teared up in the shower. I cried a little bit at work. I didn’t cry on the way home because I was talking to my mother and venting about something that I cannot and will not discuss here. And then I got home and vented to my son and The Boyfriend. But I cried myself to sleep.

And then it was Thursday. The shower was still a little iffy. (Mickey used to jump up on the side of the tub and pace along the outside of the curtain, waiting for me to finish so she could drink out of the faucet.) But then I arrived at work and found a message from my boss’ boss to come see her. I had a pretty good idea why and I turned out to be right.

I have a new job!

(Now you get why I called this post “Extremes,” right?)

A woman in the Interlibrary Loan department is leaving next month and I answered the email asking if anyone was interested in taking over her position. I really didn’t think I’d get it, because where seniority is concerned, I’m at the bottom of the list. But no one else expressed interest in moving from their current positions. Since we’re all the same classification, it’s a lateral move for everyone and there’s probably not a lot of incentive. It does have incentives for me; learning something new about how the library functions is top of the list, but getting out of circulation is up there as well (I’ve been feeling a little burned out on the customer service front lately, so a change will be nice). I’ll also be back on days, which has its good points and not so good points. Good is that I’ll be able to watch football on Sundays next fall. Not so good is that The Boyfriend and I will be on different schedules again. But he works four days to my five, so that’s not going to be a huge issue.

Either way, what started off as a horrible week ended on a much brighter note. Still, even though I spent all of Thursday evening in a great mood, even though I crawled into bed with a smile on my face that night, it didn’t stop me from thinking about Mickey.

And I still cried myself to sleep.

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Dear Mickey,

It will be 12 years ago next month when I was sitting at the dining room table at my sister’s house and you suddenly appeared on my lap. Your name was Nunya (as in nunya business) and you were only about six months old. My sister and her then-fiance had brought you home to catch mice to feed to their snake. Only you weren’t doing such a great job. They said if you didn’t shape up, they were going to feed YOU to the snake. I’m still not sure they were kidding.

You settled in on my lap and went to sleep and I knew right then that you had chosen me. Maybe you sensed the pain I was in, only months after Mike died. With my sister’s permission, I took you home with me. The boys wanted to name you Mike, but I told them you were a girl and that wouldn’t do. Michelle didn’t seem right for you either, so you became Mickey.

We’ve compared you to him many times. He hunted squirrels and you loved to chase them in the yard. He hated storms and you would hunker down and head for the basement at the first rumble of thunder. He was a man of few words, but always spoke up when it was necessary. You very rarely meowed, unless we accidentally stepped on you, or you were afraid. He had the patience of a saint. You would sit in front of the door for an hour, gazing up at the doorknob, waiting for someone to notice that you wanted outside. And when I was upset, truly upset, you were upset.

There was a terrible argument one night between the boys and me, not long after we moved into this house. There was a lot of yelling and I sat on the couch and started to cry. You stunned me by hopping into my lap and meowing at me. It was so unlike you. Really, was it any reach for me to think that you and Mike might have had a connection?

I have so many vivid pictures of you in my head. Like the time when we were living in Cleveland and heading back to Toledo for the day, and we needed to make sure you were in the house before we left. We called your name and you came running, across all of the backyards of the houses along are street, hurdling fences as you came to them. You were so funny and adorable.

I won’t forget that terrible storm we had two years ago, when I came home from work to discover the power was already out and the tornado sirens were going off. I was home alone and scared, but trying not to be. When I found the flashlight had dead batteries, I felt my way through the dark basement to get replacements, and when I finally turned the light on I was startled to find you right next to me. All through that very long night of storm after storm after storm, you never left my side - even when I ventured upstairs. You stayed with me in spite of your own fear.

All of the times you would greet me when I came home from work or school. I’d see you sitting on the porch railing as I drove down the street and when I turned the corner, you’d recognize my car and meander out toward the driveway. Or the times when you’d wait IN the driveway and I couldn’t see you, so I’d have to back up and find you just sitting there. The neighbors thought that was hysterical.

I will miss watching you roll around on the driveway in the sun and the absolute delight you showed when it was finally warm enough for sandals and you had bare toes on which to rub your face. Or the way you would race people to the bathroom, then try to cajole them into turning on the faucet so you could have a drink. But the thing that I will miss the most is how, whenever I went outside, you would come from wherever you’d been and settle in next to me. You just loved hanging out with me. And I loved hanging out with you.

You weren’t terribly pleased when we brought Alex home, but you adjusted. You’d let him nudge you out of your food dish, but watch him try to set foot in the back yard when you and I were having “hang out time” and you would attack him mercilessly until he was back onto the driveway where he belonged. And let’s not forget the battle of the sunbeam real estate. Over the past couple of days, I’ve watched him willingly give up his sunbeam spot as soon as he saw you. It’s almost as though he knows that your sunbeam time is limited.

Tomorrow, I have to say goodbye to you. You are very sick and your doctor has said that we can’t cure you; we can only treat you. And Mickey, Doodlebug, Mickeydoodle, Snickerdoodle, my beautiful girl… that isn’t fair to you. You have lived a wonderful life and you have blessed all of us with your presence. I can’t bear the thought of you not being able to do the things you love, just for the sake of having you with me for a few more months. I love you too much for that, my beautiful girl.

So, my Doodlebug, it’s time to let you go. Thank you for 12 wonderful years. I’ll save your spot on the bench outside.

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And while, yes, I’ve been spending an obsessive amount of time doing the genealogical thing, there have been some other events taking place that have my attention diverted elsewhere.

A family member has been dealing with a medical issue. Out of respect for that family member’s privacy, all I’m going to say is that things look good and we’ll have more definitive information next week.

Not quite on the same realm as the previously mentioned family member, but definitely still important, my cat Mickey is seriously ill. About two weeks ago, she stopped eating. Thinking she had some hairball issues, I stopped and picked up some Laxatone. After two days, it seemed to make a difference and she started eating again. But I was gone for the most part last weekend, and even though she appeared to be eating when I stopped in to feed her and Alex, by the time I got into my normal routine last week, I noticed she was barely touching her food. Worse, she was losing weight.

I had to wait until payday to get her into the vet, thanks to the issue with the water department. She was running a fever, which actually gave me hope that perhaps this was something treatable. But she’s also jaundiced. The vet is concerned about liver failure, given her age (she’s nearly 13). I’m finding myself in the unenviable position of wanting to do everything possible for her and knowing that my budget won’t allow it. So, I’m settling for doing what I can to get a proper diagnosis and making her comfortable in the meantime, and going from there.

They took blood last night, gave her some fluids (she’s continued to drink, so she wasn’t very dehydrated) and a shot of antibiotics. Unfortunately, she was so pissed off by the time they got to the shot that she managed to struggle out of the grasp of TWO people and bent the needle in the process. Her leg is irritated as a result. She’s not limping on it anymore, but there was a very scary moment when we first arrived home last night, where JM and I thought it was broken. (It’s not.)

But today, she wants nothing to do with food. Or water. Or me. I managed to get her to take her antibiotics and smeared some Nutrical on her face, just to piss her off some more. I’m waiting for The Boyfriend to get up to give her a pill for liver function (I do the liquid meds, he does the pills) and I’m waiting for the vet to call me back with the results of the blood work.

So, that’s where I’ve been.

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It started out innocently enough. I was trying, yet again, to locate an old friend who moved to California a couple of decades ago. Not finding him through the usual sources (Facebook, LinkedIn, etc.), I figured I’d peruse our local auditor’s website to see if his father still owned property in the area. Only one listing came up with his last name and a little more investigation showed that home ownership had transferred back in 2000, shortly after the man I thought might be my friend’s father had passed away.

“Ok,” I thought, “what would Nancy Drew do?” I smiled to myself and started looking for an obituary. If it indeed WAS my friend’s father, there might be mention of where my friend now lives.

Alas! My local paper only archives its obituaries online back to September 2000. The man I was looking for passed away in June of that year. But I knew that I’d located obits online before; I recalled reading my grandfather’s online not long ago. Damned if I could find where I saw it, though. As a last resort, I signed up for a trial membership to Ancestry.com.

And that’s where it all went to hell.

I don’t know how I actually ended up starting to document our family tree. I started with myself and my parents, and added my sons and my husband. Then I cursed the program for not letting me add the boys’ sperm donor biological father without somehow connecting him to me as a spouse. Dear God, NO! I refused his half-hearted proposal when I told him I was pregnant. (Coming, as it did, on the heels of “Are you sure it’s mine?” Oh, so romantic.)

But I digress.

I have an aunt on my father’s side who has painstakingly researched the history of our family all the way back to our relatives in Europe. That became even more clear when I entered my paternal grandfather’s name into my family tree and it immediately called up the names, along with the dates of birth and death of his parents.

On my mom’s side, however, I know next to nothing. My maternal grandfather died six years before I was born. My great grandmother (my maternal grandma’s mom) was in a nursing home with dementia by the time I was old enough to know who she was. Everyone else was already gone, save for a few great aunts and uncles, most of whom I never met or saw frequently enough to make a family connection.

My grandfather apparently lived a hard life, and his parents gave him little or no affection. As a result, he didn’t really keep in contact with his side of the family, effectively cutting off any bonds that might be forged in later generations. It’s sad enough that there are probably cousins galore out there that we’ve never met, but the thing that really bothers me now is that my mom and her brothers can’t even tell you the names of their ancestors. My dad can tell you who is who for at least two generations above his own parents. But I had to trigger my mom’s memory for her grandmother’s first name.

I was up until 3 a.m. Friday night, chomping at the bit to tell someone, ANYONE, that I had just located an online newspaper archive containing my great grandparents wedding announcement in 1907. Every five minutes, I can be heard muttering to myself, “This is so COOL!” Even my kids think so. And my mom? Well, let’s just say that as much as we tease her about her memory fading… the conversations we’ve had over the past few days have triggered a lot of memories. And I’m pretty sure she’s enjoying the discovery as much as I am.

So, I admit it. I’m hooked. I love a good mystery, after all, and it’s high time I figured out the other half of my origins. If not for my sake, for the sake of the generations yet to come.

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If today was Thanksgiving and I was seated at a table with people who were taking turns saying what they are thankful for, the first thing on my list would be coffee.

(It’s the first week of spring semester, kids. I’ll be back as soon as I can find my brain.)

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I always seem to have mixed emotions about the start of the semester. On the one hand, I’m filled with nervous excitement about my classes. I find myself logging into WebCT shortly after midnight, just to read the syllabus and see what I’m going to be up against throughout the semester.

On the other hand, I dread the madness that will ensue at work. By the time I report for duty tomorrow afternoon, I can generally expect exhausted and irritated colleagues who have been running like crazy to make sure the desk is covered at all times, especially the hours when no students are scheduled.

My goal is to get there early tomorrow, not necessarily to get a jump on my work, but mostly to find a parking spot. The first day (and week) of classes is always a parking nightmare. But depending on how many students we have and how busy it’s been, I may find a lot of things waiting to be done when I arrive; things that I can’t ignore once I’m in the building (at least not the first week of classes).

Comforted by the knowledge that my financial aid has been worked out, I just ordered my textbooks (three of them) on Amazon. JM also needed textbooks, but I managed to find his on OhioLink. I *heart* OhioLink. It is the greatest thing ever. Unfortunately, mine were not available yet. Only one of my texts showed up in the catalog and it’s current status is “Ordered copy on 12/07/2007.” Fortunately, Amazon had all of them in stock and I qualified for free 2nd day shipping. Even if I’d had to pay for shipping, it would have cost me less on Amazon than if I’d gone to our on campus bookstore. Sad, sad, sad.

So, here I sit, on my last official day of intersession break, waiting. Anticipation tinged with despair. Intersession break has many good things about it. We can leave campus every day for lunch, something we won’t experience again until spring break in March. We can run over to Starbucks in the morning without worrying that we’ll be standing in line for our entire break. We can cover the circ desk without having to get up every 30 seconds to handle whatever problem has just surfaced.

But intersession break is also missing something: energy. I spent two years working for the university in a department far removed from the heart of main campus. The day I interviewed for my present position, I practically bounced back to the parking lot with joy as I listened to the clock tower bells chime the hour and passed the throngs of students and faculty on their way to their next destinations. That was the campus I remembered from the time, not so long ago, when I’d been a full time student.

Yes, the chaos can be maddening sometimes. Even so, after three and a half years, the days I like going into work far outnumber the days I dread it. I may complain, but overall? It’s not a bad gig.

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After I bounced my check for the water bill, I contacted the department of public utilities (via email because I couldn’t wait on hold while I was at work) to inquire as to whether they would attempt to send the check through a second time, or if I should just pay the bill over the phone via their 800 number.

I was surprised to find a response within a half hour. I was told they wouldn’t put the check through a second time, and if I went ahead and used the 800 number to pay my bill, they wouldn’t charge me a fee for the returned check.

Sounds like a bargain, eh?

So, I did what they instructed. I had to pay a $6 fee in order to pay the bill on the phone, but $6 is still less than the returned check fee would have been, so it was still in my favor.

Except that they *did* put the check through a second time. It cleared. The payment I made over the phone did not.

How lovely that now I get to spend my Friday trying to find a moment at work to call my bank and find out what, if any, fees I’m facing for this latest development. Think it’ll carry any weight with them to forward the email the department of public utilities sent me?

I so do not need this right now.

Update:  The bank can’t do anything. The electronic payment cleared when my paycheck was deposited overnight. Now I’ve paid the bill twice. Oh joy. I’m pretty certain the city isn’t going to be issuing any refund, either, so my effort to start 2008 off fresh has already been derailed.

I have no one to blame but myself, but I swear if either one of my kids asks me for a dime, you’ll be reading about me in our local paper…

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As if my Christmas weren’t lovely enough, then I had to go ahead and have a spectacular New Year’s Eve!

The Boyfriend and I were invited over to the home of our friends, Pat and Dawn, for dinner and general merriment. The food was absolutely fantastic. I swear, I would like Pat to give me cooking lessons. Or maybe they could just adopt me?

As delicious as the food was, the best part of the evening was hanging out with people I haven’t seen in so long. I don’t think I really realized how far removed I’ve been from everyone and everything lately, until last night. I plan to change that this year.

And there was one thing that took place last night that really almost makes me want to cry (in a good way) when I think about it. The Boyfriend said something about this being the first New Year’s celebration where he’s been in a good mood. I can’t remember the exact words he used, but essentially he said that he felt like things were coming together. He has made so many inroads this year toward his own well-being, both physically and mentally. It hasn’t all been perfect, but it’s definitely going in a good direction. While I think I’ve been a good influence, this is all him. I’m very proud of him.

Both of us are participating in 101 Things To Do In 1001 Days. No, we’re not done with our lists (those things are hard!!) but we’re making progress. He suggested last night that we sit down on Sunday and finish putting them together. I’m shooting for either January 7th or 14th to start.

This concludes my first post in 2008. Here’s to a good year for all of us, in and out of the blogosphere!

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