TheBanyanTree: The Family

[Roger Pye]

(This is a story I wrote for Spoon back in 1997/98. It turned out to be the first of a 
trilogy of short stories but when it went to Spoon it was brand new.)

THE FAMILY

There was a family of three cats, two dogs and two humans, a male and a female who were 
very much in love with each other, who all lived in a split-level brick house on a private 
estate high in the Snowy Mountains. One of the mogs was a tiny kitten which wasn't very 
well for the first six months of its life, so it was an 'inside' cat. The other two, Bosun 
and Spot, were 13 years old and very set in their ways. They were 'outside' cats and 
didn't like the kitten very much but they tolerated her when they saw her, which wasn't 
often. They lived on the verandah at the back of the house which overlooked a peaceful 
tree-filled valley. The verandah was exposed to all weathers, blinding hot in summer and 
bitterly cold in winter. But they didn't mind the weather too much because they had an 
insulated mog box to sleep in which the man had made for them. They hated Lucy, the German 
Shepherd; when she'd first arrived, they'd hissed and spat at her so whenever she got the 
opportunity she chased them up trees. The humans despaired of finding a solution. They 
bossed the 5-year old silky terrier, Dylan Thomas, as they had ever since he was just a 
scrap of a puppy. But with the coming of the larger dog who he bossed around he seemed to 
find a new line of courage and occasionally turned on the old mogs. They didn't know what 
to make of that.

Then the family moved to a 100-year old wooden cottage on a farm, half a mile from the 
nearest road. At the back of the cottage was a tiny room which had probably been a porch 
at some time. This became the mog room; it wasn't insulated and the roof was only tin but 
with their box they were quite comfortable, more than they had been on the verandah. The 
man cut a hole in one wall only big enough for them to get in and out - and the terrier 
who made a habit of checking out their feeding bowls after every meal. The kitten, older 
now and over her sickness, was still an inside 'mog'. She slept in the bathroom near the 
water heater and had a sawdust box to poop in. The terrier was, and always had been, an 
inside dog. Lucy  was both - during the day she was chained up on the front verandah but 
at night she slept at the foot of the humans' bed.

One day Bosun was seen to be limping so he was taken to the vet. She was very concerned; 
one of his front legs was badly swollen and inflamed all the way up and she thought he had 
somehow hung himself on a wire fence and torn the ligaments. She gave him a shot and put a 
temporary strapping on the leg then she instructed the humans to keep him warm and in the 
house if possible. This created a problem. The days would be OK but the nights? The cats 
hated Lucy - she chased them whenever she could - during the evenings she and the terrier 
occupied the study where both humans worked because that was where the computer and 
wordprocessor were but the door was sometimes left open. It wasn't a warm room like the 
others because it didn't have a built-in fire or wood heater but there was an electric 
oil-filled radiator which kept conditions tolerable.

For a week the humans watched Lucy and Bosun like hawks. She was fascinated by the 
strapping and kept trying to get close enough to sniff it whereas Bosun was so dispirited 
and miserable he couldn't even be bothered to hiss or spit. At the end of the week the vet 
put a proper cast on the leg, flourescent pink in colour, and said the impossible; Bosun 
had to keep it dry! It rained for the next four days and nights so he couldn't go out at 
all. For the first three days, the two were under close surveillance but the next evening 
the humans forgot and the kitten, Bosun, Lucy and Dylan were left alone in the study for 
an hour. Fearfully they opened the door expecting to see carnage or Bosun on top of the 
bookcase. No such thing! Lucy was stretched out on the floor asleep next to the heater 
with Bosun tucked into her tummy, his bad leg stretched across one of the Shepherd's. That 
was how Lucy had cared for the kitten from the outset, and still did. There were no 
problems with these two after that. Spotty decided she was missing out and began to come 
in the cottage during the evenings, timorously at first then more boldly and still hissing 
whenever she saw Lucy. But within a couple of weeks that passed and they began touching 
noses and curling up together now and then.

The grass in the garden grew and grew because the humans didn't have a lawnmower so they 
acquired a sheep from the farm. They named her Charlotte and she performed her function 
admirably, leaving output all over the place. And, having been hand-reared, she held no 
fear of humans so left it all over the verandah as well. 	Now Lucy wasn't too fond of 
sheep, which was incongrous on a farm which had 4,500 of them, but after an initial period 
of chasing Charlotte she learned not to providing there was a human in attendance when she 
was loose. Charlotte soon got over her own fears to the point where she would run 
backwards and forwards past where Lucy was chained and then stand still and watch the 
Shepherd leap up and down on her chain and listen to her bark. Then the sheep would repeat 
the process ad
infinitum. The humans aren't too concerned about Lucy and Charlotte's relationship. They 
are confident that nature will bring its own accomodation between the two as happened 
between Lucy and the older cats.

There is a family of three cats, two dogs, one sheep, and two humans, a male and a female, 
who are all very much in love with each other, which lives in an old wooden cottage on a 
farm high in the Snowy Mountains.


(In 2001 after five years in the old wooden cottage we moved to the National Capital, 
Canberra, 120 miles away. With us went Albert, the tabby mog who had been sickly as a 
kitten through lactose intolerance, Woodstock, a ginger cat who as a kitten had taken the 
place of Bosun when he died, Lucy and Dylan. A year later Caspar came to live with us, as 
black a cat as Spot had been. These three have a cage as big as a room attached to the 
back of our house which they get to and from through an open window. Lucy and Dylan have 
both crossed the Rainbow Bridge and now we have Matilda, an 18 month old German Shepherd 
and Miss Ruby, a 4 year old Yorkshire terrier. Unfortunately we couldn't bring Charlotte 
with us because they don't allow sheep within city limits but we have managed to acquire a 
few acres across the border in NSW and we are being given a few alpacas to do the job 
Charlotte did. )

roger








Sachet wrote:
> The story that Pam posted about her Christmas light woes? Geez, back in 
> '98? Her addy was gunnymom back then.
> 
> And the post from YB about a Dangerous Man?
> 
> And Dan's StormTrooper story?
> 
> And the one from Dave about the Bonz? Shoot, I remember thinking it 
> should be made into a poster, is was so good. I think it had a medieval 
> ambiance.
> 
> Well, the point of this post is to nudge anyone who might happen to have 
> some favorite saved Spoon or Tree stories, so that we can read them 
> again. They were too good to not reminisce about now and then.
> 
> I don't have anything on this pc and the things I do have saved are on 
> floppies. Which of course this pc cannot read. <sigh>
> 
> 
> ...Sachet
> 
> 
> 
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> 
> 
>