Second Chances

Anna became a part of our family on November 29th, 2004; we had been a one-cat home since May 16th, when our dear Persian Asia left us after a lengthy struggle with an insidious injection-site fibrosarcoma that had so engaged her spine that removal would have paralyzed her. We still had Tisha, the cobbie-bodied blue Persian that had come home with us on the same day as Asia back in 1989. They weren't sisters by birth, but they both joined us when they were about three months old, and they became fast friends who must have thought of one another as sisters. They were virtually inseparable; the few times that they had to be apart, when one had to stay overnight at Dr. Lane's, the other was disconsolate. So when Asia passed on, Tisha was lonely; she would calll mournfully at night, waiting for the sister who couldn't come to stand beside her and wash her and sleep next to her on the sofa that had long ago become theirs.

We were reluctant to get another cat at first, for fear that Tisha would resent the presence of a newcomer in our home. But I found myself looking at young kittens and wondering if Tisha might accept another cat; she has never been an aggressive cat, though. Then, on a whim, I stopped at a pet store that had a "Siberian cats for sale" sign posted. There were actually four ragdolls--two male, two female--and one lone Siberian, a small mackerel tabby that took to me right away; she loved to be held, and I probably stayed there an hour or so playing with her.

And then I didn't get her. A week or so later, I stopped by again and she was gone; the clerk working that day had no idea who had bought her, or when.

Over a month passed, and I found myself driving down Canton Road again, just north of Dr. No's (my comic shop), when I decided for no apparent reason to stop by the pet store once again. And there, in a cage near the door, was that same delicately-featured mackerel tabby, still eager to be held. It turned out that the woman who had bought her had to move into a no-pets apartment, and she had returned the cat a week or so prior. Every now and then, fate makes its intentions clear--and this kitten was fated to come home with us.

Susan named her Anna--she had picked out the name the day we first saw her. We met at the house so that we could both bring her into her new home for the first time; Tisha never seemed particularly upset with her, although, she took a little while to adjust her sixteen-year-old habits to a nine-month-old's energetic exuberance. For the first night or two, Anna imitated Tisha--but by the end of the first week, we noticed that Tisha had begun to imitate Anna as well, playing with toys she had long since discarding, cajoling me into playing the "door game" with her (I slide a pencil or a string or some object under a half-open doorway, drawing it back and forth as Tisha pounces on it--it's a simple game, but it's one she used to love when she was young, and now she and Anna have both taken to it).

Anna's a remarkable cat--she loves to be around people, and keeps us constant company whenever one or both of us are at home. Having her around has helped us to balance the sense of loss at Asia's death; Anna can't replace Asia, of course, and we'd never want her to do so, but she brings her own joys.

midnight fifteen minutes gone

midnight fifteen minutes gone
or fifteen years?
in the dewy dark
years shift, illusory as shadowy companions
birthed by vapor lamps and overreaching birches
between sleeping houses, half-heard,
the whispers of eight and twelve and fifteen
when the night and I shared stolen moments

gone so long,
but midnight is forgiving
welcoming forever childhood friends
who once closed the doors on moonlit meetings

Ginger (no Mary Ann)

Current candy addiction: ginger Altoids.

The only store around here that consistently carries 'em is Cost Plus World Market, a strange amalgam of Pier One and Foreign Foods that features a lot of your standard European import food items, a few oddities... and the occasional "exclusive" like this.

If you like ginger, you'll like these. They're in a gold-accented Altoids tin, the candy itself is slightly yellow, and the flavor is strong and spicy with a bit of an afterburn... more afterburn than their cinnamon Altoids have, in fact.

Don't know why these aren't in mass distribution yet, but they should be.

Now I'm waiting for the Altoids folks to offer clove Altoids. Sounds like a flavor that should work, if you ask me!... I'll also confess that licourice (their spelling, not mine) altoids have been much more satisying than I anticipated they would be.

And Altoids remain fat free, of course!...

Leave a hole.

There isn't much more that any of us can hope to do with our lives other than to leave a hole when we leave this world.

Not a day goes by that I don't think about Mom. I remember a thousand different moments every day, a thousand little things that simply can't be replaced. I hear songs that remind me of Mom... I smell the ileagnis when I'm out walking and I think of the ileagnis in Mom and Dad's back yard and the time we would spend out there... even mundane things like chopping onions remind me of her zen attitude towards little chores like that, executing them flawlessly while carrying on conversations with us at the kitchen table. I never learned to do that; I was never very good at those little chores, because I always had to think about them.

And very few days go by that I don't think of my dear friend Carol Kalish. Carol left a hole that will always go unfilled; she loved comics, and she loved what Marvel Comics was and what it could be, and it has never been the same in her absence.

Sometimes we don't realize just how large a hole we might leave in our passing. I don't think that Mom ever saw herself as someone who would leave a hole, but she did. None of our lives are the same now that she's gone; we all measure our days by how we cope with her absence.

I don't think that Carol ever thought about how big a hole she would leave, either.

We can all hope that we leave that large a hole...

Didn't say anything about who I am, did I?

the "cliffbig" in my blog ID is short for cliff biggers... that's me. When I first signed up for AOL many, many years ago, screen names were limited to eight characters, so I took the first eight letters of my name. Since then, I've been cliffbig at oodles of other places, so I've consistently used that screen name as a monicker for iPurposes.

I'm currently editor and co-publisher of Comic Shop News, the largest-circulation pubication about comics in the hobby field. I'm also owner of Dr. No's, a comic shop in Marietta, GA, which has been home town for me for over a quarter century now (really? wow!).

I'm a former high school teacher, a wretchedly bad guitar player, a music fan (particular passions--the Beatles, CSNY, Donovan), a collector/packrat with an interest in books, comics, & music, an aficionado of Apple Computers (and a real MacAddict). Politically, I tend towards libertarian views, but I'm not a part of the libertarian party per se.

Okay, that's a start

Hi... it's been a long time!

Thirty-five years ago, I published my first not much'a nothin'. I was just shy of fifteen at the time, and my interest in fanzines had led me to respond to an announcement from Stven Carlberg (who was known as Steven at that time; the new spelling didn't come in for another year or so) of a new amateur press alliance. His apa, Myriad, sounded interesting to someone like me who enjoyed writing, drew passably well, and had access to printing--so I signed up, and began pondering a name for my first apazine.

"What are you gonna talk about in the first issue?" a friend, Gary Steele (who also became involved in the whole apa thing) asked.

"I dunno... not much'a nothin', I guess," I responded... and thus a name was born.