Sunday In Cheyenne

I wrote this some months ago. Maybe February? I am reposting it now as a siren call to Toast. Yes, I could pick up the phone and call him in New Orleans. I find this much more interesting though; picking up the phone would be giving up. And then the terrorists will have won.

This is what Sunday looks like in Cheyenne. Olivia (dog) and Artemis (cat) jump into bed with Jason (husband) and me right around the time the alarm goes off and a woman named Portia does very well on the NPR morning quiz show. The dog and cat do what my friend Chris Sullivan calls a" Singapore back room honky tonk miscegenation freak show." Here, we just call it love. They lick one another and invariably Ollie fits her mouth over Arti's whole head and gives it a gentle shake. Arti kisses Ollie back as soon as he works his head free. Ashton pads in and makes a place for himself on the floor because at 13, he no longer fits in the double size bed we sleep in. Why not get a bigger bed? I love to have Jason so close to me, that's why. Art jumps down and tries to convince Ashton to get up and provide him with salmon, which he does. The salmon is not my idea. Jas and Ash insist. We have mice in the basement and I'm always trying to cut back on Arti's food so he will go after the mice. I have given up on that scheme because Artemis shows his displeasure in a particularly aggresive way: he kills squirrels, brings them into the guest room and disembowels them on the rug. It is subtle but effective. Even with a tinkly bell on, he has killed 4 squirrels in the last month and a half. I get up and slip some shoes on, take Ollie with me over the viaduct to work, say hello to the trains and feed my barm. When we get home Ollie patrols the yard, which she believes is her job, and a very serious one. I make a fool of myself in the front yard, trying to show Ollie how to pick up the paper by crouching on all fours and picking the paper up with my teeth. Olivia ignores me and I think that perhaps the Sunday NY Times is a bad place to begin. Maybe I could start with a small section and then work our way up? It's worth a try. I put the water on for coffee, Jas is in the shower, Ash is on the couch reading The Adventures of Marlys. The big treat of the morning is admiring again, the settee. I worked all day yesterday at my girlfriends home decor shop, Salt. Directly after work I took my friends John and Jane out to see Brokeback Mountain. They ranch outside Cheyenne on one of Wyomings oldest ranches. John is a good old boy and a lovely man. Last week I disguised my voice and called his house telling him he'd won the take-a-rancher-to-Brokeback-sweepstakes, was he interested in taking "the great leap forward?" "no, ma'am, I'm sure not." Jane convinced him otherwise and I snuck us in some beer. After the show we came back to our house for dark chocolate and tea. And darn it if Jason Thomas hadn't, in one afternoon, built me a brand new settee in the bay window, the way I'd always wanted. So as soon as I finish writing this I'll eat my toast Jas made on my Sourdough Wheat Walnut with cranberries bread, read my paper and write out recipes for the class I'm teaching over in Laramie this afternoon on Sourdough. Sunday mornings are just fine in Cheyenne. If I ever say different remind me that I'm just being greedy.