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Xlibris US - Indrani Sircar

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188 pages

English

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The book is a memoir drawn from the journals and observations of the author who documents a journey across the US to an unknown city in Northern California’s Bay Area. The narrative belongs to one who always expects the unexpected. The neighborhood is new and the author explores the streets and terrain on foot. As the characters emerge, the essence of the city reveals itself. A silver haired woman next door who feeds feral cats, a reclusive couple across the fence who nurture wildlife, curious occupants of a no-pet building, a paralysed man with an emotional support cat and a menagerie of wild and tame creatures in the author’s backyard.
A feral cat enters the author’s home, giving birth to a kindle of kittens. Here begins a story of nurture which weaves itself into a lifetime’s commitment to animal love. The author, domesticating the young family, plunges headlong into a web of animal rights activists and rescuers. The rhythm of everyday life is colored by the antics of a family of cats.
The cycle of life is sweet. Sometimes bittersweet. It defines for the reader the amity between humans and animals from a nearness and depth that is rare to find.

Sujets

Biography

Autobiography

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Publié par	Xlibris US
Date de parution	04 janvier 2023
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781669849414
Langue	English
Poids de l'ouvrage	1 Mo

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0200€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

Extrait

PEOPLE AND OTHER ANIMALS:
Story of a Neighborhood
Indrani Sircar

Copyright © 2023 by Indrani Sircar.
Library of Congress Control Number:
2022922889
ISBN:
Hardcover
978-1-6698-4943-8

Softcover
978-1-6698-4942-1

eBook
978-1-6698-4941-4

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.
Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Rev. date: 12/29/2022

Xlibris
844-714-8691
www.Xlibris.com
847317
CONTENTS
Characters
Preface

Finding a Place Called Home
Snooping Around the Block
For the Love of Sam
Work of a Different Kind
A Visitor on the Fence
Feral Flight: A Sooty Path
Toby Catwings and Her Second Family
“Kindle” Becomes “Clowder”
Clan Names
Girlfriend at Home!
Seeing the World
Partings
Sleeping Arrangements
“Don’t Take It Personally”
Life without Toby
Valerie Leaves the Neighborhood
Neighboring Fences and Glimpses of Hillsborough
Fun, Games, and Matching Appearances
An American Aussie
Ben Gets the Best Grooming
Art and Disarray — The First Cat Artistry
Pet Sitting and an Outside Pet of Our Own
Tuxedo Wakes the Neighborhood
An Epitaph for Tuxedo
A Notebook for Valerie
Being Valerie for Ben—and Being Me with My Cats
Remembrance
New Toys, New Friends
To Every Season . . .
For the Love of Toby — Another Exploration
Thinking in Pictures
Fat Cats, Shelter Seekers, and a Poolside Adoption
Book Lovers’ Dilemma — E-Books Enter the Book World
Changes Unforeseen
Not So High on the Mountain
Love Thy Neighbor as Thyself
Inky Takes Charge as San Francisco Beckons
Emotional Support — A Spontaneous Act
Juggling Tasks and Realities
“You Should Work at a Pet Store . . .”
“Good Morning, World”
Good Samaritans and a Bend in Time
One Leg, Four Cats, and a Walker
Housebound and Healing with Cats
How Strangers Become Friends . . .
Nine on the Calendar . . . How Many in Cat Years?
More Change and New Directions
Coffee in a Siren Cup
All Grown Up, Keeping Up with Tomorrow
Vanishing Boundaries
Cat People and Dog Lovers at Work
Secret Santa and Retail Festivities
Happiness according to Charles Schulz
Janie Speaks Out on Three Brothers
Four “Obligate” Carnivores and a Vegan Wannabe
A Meaningful Bath
Inky and the Medicine Chest
The Special Brother
Changes within Us
Sugar — Friend and Foe
“You Have Never Been a Mother”
Bowl Scrabble
Janie Holds Her Own
Cat Anatomy — A View from Crisis Point
Time Together Alongside Nitty-Gritty
Path of the Warrior
Prognosis — A Dreaded Word
Overnight without Inky
Not Quite Normal
The Day in Rained Worms
Sharing Tippy
Day Care and a Health Revelation
How Do I Love Thee . . .
Numbers Are Not Friendly
A Time and a Season for Every Purpose . . .
A Different Kind of Love
The Next Birthday
The Promise of Human-Caliber Cancer Care
“Sounds Like a Plan”
What to Do with Nothing to Do
When Doctors Say “Hope”
Finding Scout’s House
A Yoga Mat and a Paddle Board
The Road Less Traveled
Red Letter Day
A Terrible Haircut
Finding Her Balance
The Jitters
Body and Mind
Home, With or Without Janie
Flyer Becomes My One and Only
Unusual Gifts
The Health Watch
May 25, 2020 — A Day When America Changed
Banguela, the Guest
Not Quite Anti-Cat
Camping Indoors
Flowers, Laundry, and a Surprise
Cat Scratches and a Vet’s Visit
A Hairpin Bend
The Scarf

Gallery of Images
CHARACTERS
Mark
Sam
Charlie
Valerie
Tom
Don
Vera
Laura
Toby
Mel
Bumper, Kim, Speck, and Snow
Inky (a.k.a. Sumo)
Flyer
Tippy (a.k.a. Tipper)
Janie
Talia
Patricia
Sally
Beth
Frank
Tuxedo
Tortie
Tiger
White Tuxedo
Colleen
Sean
D’Marcus
Pallavi
Eric
Ed
Dr. Frank
Dr. Gyulassy
Dr. Hovde
Dr. Wolf
Dr. Aki
Dr. Schmidt
Dr. Marker
Dr. Quarterman
Dr. Bell
Dr. McCoy
Phil
Cayla
David
Michelle
Shreen
Ardene
Johnny
Kay
Rev. Penny Nixon
Anjali
Theresa
Jeffrey Holec
Susan Dosso

This book is dedicated to Dr. Marilyn Frank, DVM, long-standing veterinarian of Camino Real Pet Clinic, Burlingame, California.
Inspiration for this book came from a feral cat whom I named Toby. While with me and far away, she connected me to her wild self with a golden cord of animal love. Toby may be the only known feral who carried a veterinary health plan in her life.
I make special mention of Susan Dosso and Jeffrey Holec of Orillia, Ontario, Canada. In a friendship that lasted two decades, Sue and Jeff bridged two countries with their affection, advice, letters, and conversations on animal love.
My deep appreciation goes to Ben Yount, who helped me edit my drafts and choose my photographs. This work would not have been possible without his encouragement. Dr. Yount is a dentist who spent his youth with cats.

What was once enjoyed and deeply loved, we can never lose. For all that we love deeply becomes part of us.
— Helen Keller
PREFACE
Distance, I believed, is a state of mind. When I left Ontario, Canada, in the year 2000, I realized that 4,500 kilometers was a physical timescape to be traversed in seven days. My partner and I were headed for California, and as we drove away from Toronto, a sense of the unknown escalated. My mind locked the doors on a place we had called home.
I called the journey an adventure. We were to rebuild a life with the jigsaw of the past and the present and make a relationship out of the bonds that had frayed. There was expectation, newness, and disquiet. The season was midsummer—blazing sun, highways, and open fields with furrowed land and scattered cotton wool clouds.
The roadmap near the dashboard was crisp. This was our compass across the Canadian border into Michigan.
Behind us, the U-Haul carrier contained the belongings of a spartan Toronto household. Although they had been efficiently packed, the nature of our possessions was not quite harmonious. They were an amalgam of two personalities trying to merge home and hearth. The six boxes of books were our prize collection of favorite fiction. We did not let the books scatter and lose themselves in the course of packing. The rest was furniture that makes a human habitat comfortable.
I was not driving. Being a passenger was a luxury. The driver gets to count the navigate traffic, count truck stops, and maneuver exits to motels. The passenger gets to see the big sky, grasslands, and standing crops and feel awe at human endeavors for building highways across a continent.
After Michigan came Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska, Wyoming, Utah, Nevada, and finally the destination, California. I soaked up the roads not to write a travelogue but to remember the exhilaration of mobility and the sense of the outdoors. The big city faded away from me, and whatever urban angst had remained within me was lost in the sweep of breeze through the open car window.
Open spaces have abundant power. I, a tiny human, was a moving speck day into night, watching the color of the horizon change as noon blended into evening. The sky turned into a canvas of red, pink, and purple. Strands of clouds converged into the pinpoints of perspective, and the road seemed to go on forever. Nightfall brought out the stars as bright as Christmas ornaments.
We were alone on the road. It felt good. There was a feeling of peace, although the terrain was unknown.
Should anyone have asked me what I would remember many years later after having taken this road, I would say the spirit of the land and the little bends where we stopped to rest.
At Kalamazoo, Michigan, we ate our first American meal.
Entering Chicago, Illinois, we saw our first humorous billboard:
I do not question your existence. (signed) GOD
Then we counted skyscrapers just to make ourselves look heavenward.
Des Moines, Iowa, brought a thousand flowers within sight. A botanical garden is not a drive-through. We could not stop to smell all the roses.
Omaha, Nebraska, stood on the banks of the Missouri River. The riverfront was etched with history as Lewis and Clark’s landing place. I bought my first postcard in Omaha with a picture of the meadowlark, Nebraska’s state bird.
A sleepover at Denver, Colorado, was notable for the first good mattress for tired bones. The motel was a random pick. Larimer Square’s restaurants beckoned, but I recall eating in. It was not fast food and not in a paper bag.
The Old West came right afterward. Cheyenne, Wyoming, seemed like an urban oasis after vast fields of standing wheat and corn. Someone had said, “When you see God’s country, you will know.” Where the sky and fields meet is where God lives. Wyoming was a clo