01:40 - 22.03.07
Five Smooth Stones
Felines - the outdoor type - have been the theme the past few weeks. As the weather starts to warm up - and down and up and - down, the outside cats are making their presence known to each other again. Establishing territory and boundaries both. Our front step appears to have become one of the cornerstones for a couple of the bigger more aggressive males. Oh yeah. First it was the middle of the night howling matches. They would carry on at the side of the house. Then it became a daytime affair too. What was strange to me last week was when I heard that yowling going on right on that front door step. Now we do have three bodacious females - Ms Kitty, Snowy and Wildfire - but they are all spayed. Why was an outside male a-coming courting, eh? Found that out yesterday when another howling match erupted alongside the house in the middle of the afternoon. Three cat voices going to it and sounding as though there was also some rough play being involved in it. No violence is allowed in my domain. Never was not even with six sons to raise. That isn't going to change because of some ill-mannered outdoor types. I grabbed a bowl filled with drinking water for our cats - all of whom were staying well away from the sound of the yowling - opened my front door and doused the combatants equally. They all scattered. It was the male cat from next door plus their yearling - neither of whom is neutered - and the one big old piebald cat that got Ms Kitty in the family way the first time she became a mother. Last year the neighbours' cats would visit our cats through the screen door you see - so I guess the fight is over who has the right to visit. The problem escalated today I noticed. You see I went to pick up groceries. When I returned it was to be greeted by that strong spray that male cats use to mark their territory - all over my front step. Yeuck. Do you know anything that will repel those males without causing them harm, dear diary?
The inside felines seem quite happy to stay indoors these days. They spend a lot of their time clustered around me as i try to travel about the house on errands as well as cooking and cleaning duties. It's as though they feel I need their comfort and support as I toil away. They will approach and offer their paws from time to time - almost like they want to high five the filler of their kibble bowls. I've taken to reading to them in self-defense - it puts them into a deep sleep. I think that's a good sign isn't it? When I sing along with youtube now Mr Mel sits on top of the monitor straight backed and waving his tail as though it is a baton. When I am singing sprituals with Ms Mahalia and Ms Dinah - Elijah Rock and Rock of Ages - or down by the riverside he sits upas though he knows it's a song of praise and worship. It appears he thinks I am singing directly to him. Guess he is having flashbacks to when the Egyptians worshipped the fertility god Bast - the cat. Occasionally he will pat the top of my head in approval. Glad someone likes my singing.
It appears that JK Rowling is about to do something different on her website. Can't say exactly where I get that feeling, but little shifts of some of the items regularly placed there are often an indication of intent on her part. Got me to musing about her last book. As I've mentioned before, she puts nothing on her website unless it serves a specific purpose with her books. She has mentioned being a researcher for Amnesty International and links to their website. One of the themes of her books is the abuse of power in numerous situations - not just in the big, bad villain either. Remember the action in the first story - after the prologue introducing the reason for Harry's placement on Privet Drive - starts out with the bullying and emotional abuse that Harry receives from his "blood" family. The neglect and obvious willfulness to barely meet his basic physical needs are equally abuses of power in the key of passivity. I think she may have invoked the magical world as a way to make the lessons she offers children in ways to spot and name abuses of power less threatening to her little readers. They all know that there is no magic world, so the scary behaviour is far enough removed from their reality so they can observe the action with some objectivity. "It's not real". They may definitely personally identify with aspects of the instances of abuse out-lined, such as bullying, but not internalise it directly because of the safety provided by the barrier of the "not real" magical world. Rowling progresses to schoolyard bullying, as well as the dominance and abuse that some people who have power over children and their families - in the form of Professor Snape - impose.
She uses the three main characters as foils to show children how to respond to abuse aimed at them or others who are powerless to protect themselves, without becoming abusers themselves. She does this by showing them being held to account by their mentors and teachers in each instance, until they start to become proficient in that behaviour themselves. She also shows how good intentions without that accountability turn people who originally mean well with high aspirations into abusers of power themselves. Think of the two Bartemius Crouchs and Mr Fudge, for example. Workplace harassment and it's ripple effects appears to be highlighted when the Order of the Phoenix comes to the big screen this summer, in the persons of Dolores Umbridge in an active form and through Mr Fudge as Minister for Magic in the oppressive form. That is if the reviews of the recent screenings are accurate.
There seems to be some foreshadowing of the next layer of abuse she will address in the form of some of the interplay between the students at Hogwarts as teen romance becomes part of the picture - such as Hermione's date with McLaggen. The abuse of those one deems below them - "pure blood to mudblood", "one race of creatures over another" et al - seems to be coming out to a more open expression too. The reason being that those substitute words - like Lord Voldemort - become a tool to manipulate people both through their hopes and their fears. Twisting natural, healthy emotions into weapons to bring about fear, silence and complicity as each participant begins to feel isolated and divided even in their own families - like Percy Weasley - and communities such as the school itself.
JK Rowling demonstrates that keeping lines of communication open and telling the entire story as well as calling thing by their real name, instead of the words the abusers use to rationalise their behaviour/stereotypes, are some of the most effective techniques for removing some of that power over others. She uses the characters of Dumbledore and McGonagall as the key vehicles to express the thoughts and analysis that best serve dealing with abuse of power in a conscious and effective manner. Issues of redemption seem also to be foreshadowed. It is truly interesting to see a lot of the techniques developed and used by Amnesty International showing up in appropriate situations faced by the protagonists of the series. Wondr how JK ties it all up. How does the reality of the intractible abuse of power finish in a children's story. Don't know. Cats and owls are supposed to figure prominently in the resolution of this last story. Maybe mine know the answer, eh?
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