Barn Kittens and Backyard Spirits

My second wife Anne and I had many cats as pets through the years. My first was King Tut, Anne’s cat, which became part of my family when she and I married. Glancing through some old pictures, I found images of the second and third cat members of my family.

Anne and I were in the oil business. A drilling contractor named John was dating Sheryl, a young woman that worked for Anne and me. He had a little ranch on the west side of Oklahoma City, several horses, and a barn. Blessed by many barn cats, he gave two kitties named Buster and Squeaky, to Sheryl. Sheryl kept Buster and gave Squeaky to Anne and me.

Squeaky became our first female cat, and neither of us realized how fast these beautiful animals mature. Because of our oversight, Squeaky became pregnant and had a litter of beautiful kittens. We found good homes for all the kittens except for one, a calico we kept and named Chani after a character in the Dune series that Anne loved. Squeaky and Chani soon became inseparable. When Squeaky had her second litter, Chani wasn’t far away, and often as not in the litter basket with the kittens.

When the oil business busted, Anne and I lost our home and moved to a rented house, Chani, Squeaky and Tut moving with us. During the difficult years that ensued, we moved five times. Some of the cats didn’t live that long, but Chani made all five moves.

Calicos are three-colored cats, and they are always females. Chani was a gorgeous, three-colored cat with a distinctive voice. She always let you know when she was around. She loved affection and would live on your lap if you’d let her. She also liked to drink water from the tap.

Chani died at the age of nineteen, still the queen bee of our cat family until the time of her death. I buried her in the flower bed where she liked to lie in the spring and summer. Now Anne is dead, a victim of cancer, and spirits abound around the Wilder household. I’m fairly sure Chani still holds sway over her departed brothers and sisters. I’m also certain that Squeaky is around and she and Chani, as they were in life, are again inseparable.

Born near Black Bayou in the little Louisiana town of Vivian, Eric Wilder grew up listening to his grandmother’s tales of politics, corruption, and ghosts that haunt the night. He now lives in Oklahoma where he continues to pen mysteries and short stories with a southern accent. He is the author of the French Quarter Mystery Series set in New Orleans and the Paranormal Cowboy Series. Please check it out on his Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo and iBook author pages. You might also like to check out his website.

Of Moths and Men

My garage is partially connected to my utility room and stays cool in the summer and warm in the winter. My kitty Buttercup has a bed on top of my old Triumph TR4 and usually sleeps there every night. I have a lamp with a small wattage bulb that is always on.

Tonight, when I was giving Buttercup a kitty treat, I was greeted by what I at first thought was a large butterfly. It had gotten into the garage somehow and was fluttering around, desperately looking for a way out.

The creature was dark, and the more I looked at it, the more I began to think it was a bat. It was that large. Finally, it landed on a rafter and didn't move. I went into the kitchen, returning with a flashlight to see what I was dealing with.

The creature was neither butterfly nor bat. It was, in fact, a moth. A very large moth. I returned to the kitchen for a paper towel.

Very gingerly, I surrounded the moth and took it outside, unfolding the paper on the shrubbery, beneath a floodlight. It was then I saw the creature was even bigger than I had originally thought, with a wingspan of at least six inches. I kid you not! Shutting the garage door, I returned to the kitchen for my camera.

The moth was still on the paper towel when I returned with my camera but it gave me not even a second to point, focus and shoot. Fluttering off the paper towel, it passed in front of the floodlight, giving me one last glorious view, then fluttered away into the darkness and disappeared.

Even without my picture, I felt honored that I had witnessed such a large, beautiful and stately creature, and glad that I hadn't hurt it in my quest to rescue it from its captivity. I found a pic of an identical moth on the Web.

All of Eric's books are available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and on his iBook author pages, and his Website.