INTRODUCTION

RED-TAILED HAWK

At first glance the three posts I have created for this blog don’t seem to have much in common. One post, “The Night Sky Unleashed,” is for science and focuses on describing nature. A second post, “The Pride of Milton,” posits a question about animal behavior. But in depicting the antics of my cats, I indirectly talk about human behavior, too. My third and last section, “The Journals of Darwin & Audubon,” compares and contrasts the journal entries of two famous people, Charles Darwin and John James Audubon. A closer look at my posts, however, reveals a few important similarities. First, all three sections were written as in-class writing assignments and later developed and edited for this blog. Second, all three posts share my writing style and personal voice. And last, all three posts are about places, animals, and people that I am interested in.

THE NIGHT SKY UNLEASHED

TESSIE

My dog walk started about fifteen minutes earlier than usual. Two of my cats also joined us. The air temp was cool, just the way I like it. There was no to little wind. I felt comfortable in my shorts and red Sanibel Island tee-shirt. We headed into a backyard behind a large Victorian house. Tessie was loping along on her leash. I saw them first: a pair of gleaming eyes, shining low near the ground, and bouncing toward us. I assumed the eyes belonged to a neighborhood cat. Then I saw another pair of eyes zigzagging closely behind the first pair. And then another. These weren’t cats. They were raccoons! I flash-backed my vet visit two weeks ago, when I had to bring Dobby in for bite wounds. The repair bill cost over $300. (Raising kids is cheaper.) Dobby couldn’t join us as usual tonight because the town has order me to keep him indoors for forty-five days until the threat of rabies has passed. Were these raccoons rabid? 

I tugged at the leash to get Tessie to move back. She wouldn’t budge. I called out to Sirius. He was pressed low to the ground by a stone wall. He wasn’t budging, either. The raccoons scrambled around to the side, where there was more tree cover. I heard one of them shriek a warning. Or was it a dare? I yanked Teesie into the front yard. Safe, I thought. Wrong. Now Tessie was on her hind legs barking at something in the distance. Was it the raccoons again? Or was she barking at nothing at all, which dogs are want to do? Slowly, white flashes appeared at the edge of my viewing. Two white-tailed deer were browsing by the road. They lifted their heads in unison when they saw us. I expected them to head off. They didn’t. 

HUBBLE IMAGE OF UNIVERSE

Tessie and I headed west into a large field. We stood on the crest of an hill. The grass was newly cut. I looked at the sky. At first it looked like a huge solid black dome. But then I began to notice more shades of blue, and some lighter patches.  A haze of white clouds imprinted itself against the northern horizon. City lights stained the sky with more haze. Stars were out. Not many. Maybe thirty in total. No moon. I did not recognize any constellations. This disappointed me. Constellations seem to add beauty to the night sky. And meaning, too. This night sky looked terribly average. Two stars formed a straight line. Another set made a small triangle. Some stars were high, almost straight above me. i had to crane my neck to look. Others sat just above the line of looming trees.  One star was larger and shone more brightly than all the others. It seemed like a flawless diamond. Cold Play has a song called “Yellow.” In it Chris Martin sings, “Look at the stars. Look how they shine for you. And everything you do. Yeah, they were all yellow.” But all the stars I saw were white. I also think I saw a planet. I don’t know which one. Its light was steady, golden in tone. When i looked more closely, I detected hints of reds and greens. They planet glowed like an eye. It was its own fortress against the dark. It was easily the night’s highlight. 

My concentration was distracted by a loud, sharp noise. A car engine had back-fired in the distance. When I looked back into the sky, I saw a plane. Its lights shone. It must have taken off from Logan. Where was it going? Was this a red eye special? Were the passengers going on business or pleasure? The plane’s silence struck me as eerie, especially in contrast with the car’s loud noise. The plane soon disappeared from view.

As we walked along, street lamps punctuated the darkness at regular intervals. They lit up the sidewalks, helping us to see, but they also illuminated the bright white petals of the popcorn trees. A mini-oasis of daylight at ten o’clock in the evening. A passer-by  walked abruptly past. I told him about the raccoons. 

It’s odd but the sky makes me feel as though I am looking both into the future, and into the past, at the dawn of creation.  On the one hand the night sky, especially one that is crowded with stars, can make me feel tiny. But it can also make me feel alive.

Our walk over, Tessie and I bounded up the stone steps to our house. We were joined by Sirius and Fleur. We were all safe for one more night.

THE PRIDE OF MILTON

SCORPIUS

We rescued our first barn cats almost six year ago. The first two we took home were a black male, named Sirius, and a gray female. We named her Fleur. Dobby followed the next year. Last year we closed out the brood by taking Scorpius. Along the way we also adopted a dog, Tessie. A barn cat’s life is hard. Disease and weather kill many. So do dogs and coyotes. I’m sure cows and farm machinery add a few deaths. And if the cat population ever gets too plentiful the farmer takes matters into his own hands. In short, a barn cat’s life is short. Do our cats ever show gratitude that we saved their lives? I like to think they do. In fact, I like to think they feel many emotions that humans do,  ranging from happiness to fear. The one emotion, however, they seem to lack is remorse. My cats never seem to feel guilty for the bad things they do. Why not?

The jury seems divided about cats and emotions. Some researchers and others do not think cats have real emotions. Others do think cats feel. But this group is divided over what kinds of emotions. In an online article “Do Cats Have Emotions?” published on April 10, 2009 on a website called “Cats@suite101”by Jennifer Copley, I found the following statement: “Humans can engage in metacognition because they have a level of self-consciousness that cats do not possess, which enables them to think about the meaning of their emotions as well as their current and future implications.” I understood this to mean that as a human i can question my motives and behavior in a way that my cats can’t. Armed with this knowledge, I felt more comfortable studying my cats’ behavior.

Sirius is the king of the bunch. Everything that happens in the cat world must get his approval. When healthy, he weighs close to fifteen pounds. That’s big. Sirius has black fur, with a small tuft of white tucked under his chin. In spring his fur seems tinged with a blue luster. He looks like a jaguar. The summer sun tinges his coat with chestnut highlights. Sirius has almond greenish yellow eyes. Standard equipment. Part of his right ear is missing. Sirius loves to go on walks with me and Tessie. So do the other cats. Unlike them, he will go for a walk in any weather, including snowstorms and torrential downpours. He will also go anywhere with us. He’s a great companion. The problem with Sirius is that he gets into fights. His behavior has cost me plenty, and has made me short tempered whenever I hear the familiar cat wails, hisses, and screams outside. Whenever I open to door, there is Sirius, with his fur standing on end. I yell at him, “Bad cat! Get in here!” He doesn’t care for my opinion. Nor does he look sheepish. He just comes in and goes over to the cat bowl. 

I am convinced that Dobby is part alien. Either that or the antibiotics we fed him as a kitten to ward off a severe respiratory infection altered his brain chemistry. But he is goofy and lovable. He purrs constantly. He shares Sirius’ coloring but not his bulk. And he does not seem remotely kingly, or even princely. Dobby loves to curl up on my legs and take a nap whenever I am watching TV or lying down in bed. If he sees me petting another cat, he comes right over. It’s not out of jealousy. He just wants a piece of the attention that’s going around. Dobby’s sweet spot for my legs is fine when I am sitting. But he can become entangled in my feet when I walking along. This can be a nuisance. His behavior can also be dangerous. One morning as I was groggily walking down the stairs to make the breakfast coffee, Dobby was insistent on following closely along. Too closely. I lost my balance and fell hard down the steps. I hurt my back. Getting to my feet was difficult. Dobby sauntered by.He seemed curious but not in the least remorseful. “Stupid cat!” I yelled. He just purred sweetly, and happily sprang down the rest of the stairs.

Scorpius looks like a cat that ancient Egyptians would worship. He is sleek and beautiful. His gray fur shines. His form is perfect. His mind seems pure cat-like. Being just a kitten he loves to play at every opportunity. The other cats often find him annoying. He doesn’t care. He pounces on them anyway. Scorpius doesn’t mind anyone’s swats or hisses. He never backs down. Unlike the other cats, Scorpius isn’t attached to human affection. Sure, he’ll sit to be petted, if you ask him to. But he’s got other more mysterious things on his mind. Don’t ask me what. My wife is a gardener. In one corner of the living room, she’s set up a small plant nursery. When the plants get bigger and the nights stay warm enough, she’ll plant the plants outside. Anne is hoping for a bumper pea crop this year. There’s just one problem: Scorpius loves to dig the small plants up out of their little pots. We find them uprooted and lying on the floor. They look like dead soldiers on a battlefield. Whenever i am upstairs and I hear Anne’s screams from below, I know what has just happened. I race downstairs just in time to see a silver streak romp past me and go into hiding until things calm. Scorpius certainly looks fearful. But I also detect a slight smirk on his face. He’s won again. I try to tell Anne that he’s not being malicious, he’s just doing what cats do. Scorpius can’t feel guilty about his actions. If anything, I feel guilty. I’m the one who rescued him.

I call Fleur, the assassin. She’s a great stalker and an acrobatic tree climber. I know she’s killed a bird or two. And lots of moles and chipmunks. In terms of the pride, Fleur is the lone female. She defers to the others. She lets them eat first. She waits for them to enter or leave the house before she does. Fluer is light gray, and sort of marbled with white streaks. She is lightweight and super fast. Unlike the other three, she does not like to be held. One day when I came home from school, I noticed all the cats outside together. This was unusual. Fleur lurks, she does not join in. But here she was, sitting by a bush with the others. I soon saw the reason. Fleur had cornered a chipmunk. Her eyes and tail twitched nervously. She and the other were waiting for the chipmunk to tire and fall from its branch. Nothing doing, I thought. I’m saving this poor little animal (are chipmunks rodents?) So I threw stones and yelled like a banshee. Reluctantly, but not guiltily, the cats gave up their posts. Looking closer at the chipmunk, I saw that it was bleeding. One of its eyes dangled on its cheek. In the battle that ensued between me and my cats, which they finally won, the cats never gave up on their prey. Even when I upped the ante and threw a shovel at Dobby, the cats continued to pace and swarm. I guess it was their version of being on the Serengeti. Lions don’t feel sad about killing their prey. Why should my cats? 

The next morning when I went outside, I found a present the cats had left for me on the  doormat: the head of a chipmunk. In a weird way, I felt proud at their prowess. But then I quickly felt guilty. Cats and humans share many emotions. Remorse is not one of them.

THE JOURNALS OF DARWIN & AUDUBON

HMS BEAGLE

At the end of 1831, Charles Darwin embarked on a five-year voyage around the world. He was in his early twenties, unknown, and looking for something to do that would propel him forward in life. His task aboard the Beagle was simple: keep the captain entertained with his company. While on his travels, Darwin kept a journal. Another traveler, John James Audubon, also kept a journal. In 1820, he set out down the Mississippi River in search of birds to shoot and then to paint. In a sense, Audubon was his own captain. He was also an artist, and American of French descent. Like Darwin he was unknown. But he knew what he wanted to do, and he was willing to leave his family behind in order to achieve his goal. As a result of their respective journeys, both men became famous, and helped shaped how future generations view the world of nature.

Using broad categories I would say there are two main types of writing that Darwin employs in this book: curious traveler and observing scientist. Here is an example, taken from his account on July 5th, 1832, of Darwin writing as a traveler: “The sea was so highly luminous, that the tracks of the penguins were marked by a fiery wake, and the darkness of the sky was momentarily illuminated by the most vivid lightning” (70). And here is a sample of Darwin writing as a scientist: “The remains of these nine great quadrupeds, and many detached bones, were found embedded on the beach, within the space of about 200 yards square” (96). Most of the early chapters are the former type. Darwin writes about what he sees in the landscape, in nature, and in human society. His travels are not without risk, as he must depend upon the hospitality of those who would give him food and shelter as well as upon the gauchos and others who help assure his safety when traveling away from the Beagle. It might be more fitting to call Darwin an explorer.

Chapter 5 offers the first sustained writing effort effort of Darwin as scientist. Here he is looking at the landscape, with its flora and fauna, and trying to figure out the evolution of animals to this area and how vegetation does or does not relate to the size and abundance of the animals such as ostriches and the rarer Rhea that area living here as well as to the extinct animals whose fossils have been found in a deposit by a beach. Darwin uses Historical Geology to reconstruct what happened and offers his ideas that contrast with conventional wisdom. Darwin is the young scientist staking out his territory, his place in the world of science. We know in hindsight what waits for Darwin once he gets to the Galapagos. But his journeys around South America offer him an excellent place to prepare.

While nature and science are the main areas of interest for Darwin, the reader can observe him struggling to make sense of two human evils: slavery and Indian wars. His moods and thoughts often differs about these social issues. In chapter 5, he seems to see the wars as a necessary evil, though he abhors the practice of killing Indian women and children. While he condemns this as an affront to his Christian morals, he does not seem to realize the same thing is going on in North America.

Audubon writes in a different style and with a different purpose. He uses his journal to record his activities, to note where he is traveling and under what conditions. He is quick and almost notational in his writing style: “I saw several Flocks of Ducks in the Morning before We had cleaned our Guns==hundreds of Meadow Lark Alauda magna  few travelling Southwest----the Wind Rose and brought us to Shore, it raind and bloed Violantly until the Next Day--” (4). This passage, taken from his October 12th, 1820, entry also shows Audubon’s quirky spelling, hyphenation, and capitalization. His style is reminiscent of Emily Dickinson’s.

Audubon also uses his journal to gripe about his money problems. in addition to hunting and painting, Audubon stops in art stores in cities to try and sell his art work. He stays with wealthy families for a time and tutors the usually talentless children in painting. Often times Audubon gets cheated out of money owed him. 

Unlike Darwin, Audubon feels the tug of home. Despite his future goal, which he is determined to achieve, Audubon is always looking back to the family he left behind. His first journal entry opens with these lines; “the feelings of a Husband and a Father, were my lot Lot when I Kissd My Beloved Wife & Children with an expectation of being absent for Seven Months--”(3).

Journals are used to record a person’s private thoughts. But when a person becomes famous, as did Darwin and Audubon, their journals become public. I think the audience for these journals want to glean some understanding of the mind and character of these two great men. Darwin in the better writer. But Audubon is appealing in his directness and touching in his despair over money and being alone. Audubon was an artist, but he had to know a lot of science to write about and paint his birds so accurately. Darwin was a scientist, but his journal entries rival the talents of a strong creative writer. Their journals are of great benefit.

AUDUBON

CONCLUSION

Writing a blog adds new features to writing an essay for class. Inserting visuals, choosing templates and layouts, adding fonts and background colors help direct the eye and mind of the reader. I hope the blog format adds excitement and interest for the reader. For the writer, a blog format seems more fluid, less stodgy than the classic. I can create and change things quickly. Another welcome change is that it is easier to build and add to the blog as I go along. The only drawbacks were learning the new operational tools and designs set by blogger as well as figuring how best to include sources. “Three Pieces” was fun to construct. My professor is the greatest!