Theo Horses Around in Vienna

 It's been years since I've visited Vienna. Like a little kid in a candy store, I can't wait to look around and see what I can find. Theo, my gangster cat, is a bit less enthusiastic. Because Vienna is a hustling, bustling place, chocked full of ancient buildings and, perhaps, too many people, he seems intimidated.

I promise him--we'll find something you like. Trust me.

Eagerly I snap photos as we head toward the main part of the city. We pass our first church affectionately called the Mexican Church:

We pass the graffiti building (or at least that's what I call it):

We cross a bridge over a Danube River tributary:

In Vienna proper now, we're on foot, within the Ringstrasse, an elegant 2.5 mile boulevard which encircles the old town. In 1857 this boulevard replaced Vienna's ancient city walls. We cross beneath an old but magnificent arch. Now I'm beginning to feel Vienna's heart:

All of that leads us to our first glimpse of St. Stephan's Church, which took hundreds of years to build from 1137 when they first broke ground to 1578 when it was finally completed. This mixture of both Romanesque and Gothic architecture stands on the ruins of two earlier churches. Over the years it has been the scene of numerous weddings including Joseph Haydn and Mozart. 

I am in awe. If I believed in time travel, standing inside St. Stephan's Church, on ground that's existed for so many centuries, would be the first step in finding a way to travel through time. 

Explaining that idea to Theo, however, is a waste of time. He'll watch something on the History Channel (especially if there are animals in the show) . . . but outside the church he finally looks interested. 

Horses. A white wheeled horse drawn carriage to be precise that is attached to four gorgeous white horses. For tourists who like to imagine that they're back in Mozart's time when people still rode horses and took carriage rides--not for fun but to get somewhere. 

Theo looks up at me expectantly. The driver, who was there one minute ago, is gone for some of that excellent Vienna coffee, so this is our chance, I think. 

"Behave yourself," I caution automatically although how much danger can Theo actually be in when the horses are tied to their carriage. 

Theo approaches cautiously and keeps his distance, at first. But then he can't resist the lure of his fellow animal. His nose twitches. He's sniffing from afar (which will never be good enough).

I know Theo. Sure enough, before I can step in between him and the lovely white horse he's fixated on, Theo is there, standing near the horse's leg, sniffing away. The horse glances down as much as he can, despite the blinders that surround his face.

Who's that? he's probably wondering. Or has he figured everything out already because he can smell Theo. 

Suddenly, I imagine everything going to hell. What if the horse decides he doesn't want some American cat sniffing him, and now even cozying up to him? What if he lifts one of his legs and uses that gigantic hoof to try and kick Theo away? I half imagine Theo flying through the air, like in some cartoon and ending up where--on top of St. Stephan's. 

I reign in my imagination and dread. The encounter is a peaceful one. 

For me, it's a lesson in how the world can be perceived so differently by one person to the next, one person to a cat. Theo sees the horse. I see St. Stephan's, in all its historical magnificence. 

Theo and Pearl's Tadpoles

 As is often the case with Theo, the gangster cat, and historic buildings, he's more interested in the wildlife and the beauties of nature than furniture and the historical ambiance that makes certain places so special. Tucked away in the Bucks County countryside in Pennsylvania, Pearl S. Buck, the renowned author of The Good Earth lived with her publisher husband and adopted children.

The farmhouse they purchased after their marriage was old. They needed to renovate and expand. Acres and acres of luscious farmland surrounded them. They split their time between a townhouse in NYC during the week and their country estate on weekends. They installed all the latest amenities--running water, indoor plumbing, electricity. Near the kitchen a giant bell was rung to call the children in for lunch.

At that time, Bucks County attracted wealthy and famous New Yorkers who wanted to leave the country behind. Musicians, writers and artists surrounded them including Oscar Hammerstein and James Michener.  

I read The Good Earth years ago in college. Buck was born in the USA but grew up in China so she was more than familiar with the culture and mores. Born from Missionary parents, she spent a great deal of her adulthood in China until it became too dangerous to stay. 

I was impressed by the novel, a best-seller which won the Pulitzer Prize in 1932 and then a Nobel Price in 1938 for her keen depictions of Chinese peasant life. Her house and grounds have been preserved. It is now a destination to visit: 

Dan, Theo and I are given a private tour of her house. We're taken from room to room as we learn her story. Her house is an odd mixture of Pennsylvania farmhouse and Chinese artifacts. 

When I visit her house, I'm even more impressed with how she lived her life. She was a fierce advocate for children, especially mixed-race children, who back in the day were often unadoptable. Over the years she and her husband, true to their convictions, filled their house with the children they adopted. She also used her earnings to start a Foster Home, which she located on her property near her own house. 

She didn't live a perfect life. Controversies surrounded her. But what does all this have to do with tadpoles?

Outside on the side of her farmhouse, there is a stream which leads into a small pond with a bridge, the perfect habitat for tadpoles. 

Before Theo expresses an interest, I know little about them. But a quick search on google reveals that they are the hatched darlings of frog eggs. When they hatch, they first feed off of the yolk of their egg and then swim around in search of algae. 

In the initial stage they have a mouth at one end and a tail at the other. In the course of three to four months, they lengthen, grow front and back legs and begin to metamorphose into frogs.

Theo seems to instinctively know the tadpoles are there. He wanders over to the stream, too close for my comfort, and leans in--his keen cat eyes searching the water for any sign of movement. He's ever curious and like a laser beam, spots the tiny fellows darting here and there.

Theo is not a fan of water, but I issue a stern warning anyway: "The tadpoles are not for eating, Theo, only watching."

Can a cat grunt? Approval or disapproval? I hear something, and then his tail wags, slowly at first, and then with greater velocity. 

He's going to jump in. I can feel it. But Dan is one step ahead of me. He's been watching Theo's signs. The stare. The crouch before the leap.

Dan swoops up Theo, says nothing, but shakes his head, confirming there will be no tadpoles for dinner today.

We walk away, across the field, toward the lovely bamboo that lines the edge of their property. Bamboo is an invasive species, not that hard to cultivate, but still I'm impressed. 

As we leave the property, we make one more stop. Pearl S. Buck is buried on her own property. It is a cool, quiet place. She designed her own headstone with one word only--her birth name in Chinese characters. Quite a statement. Even Theo comes over to pay her tribute. 

Despite the tadpole almost incident, Theo's a good boy at heart. He dutifully sniffs the grasses surrounding Buck's grave. He'll no doubt dream of tadpoles tonight.

Theo-The Museum Menace

 We're in Doylestown, PA and it's a long day. Despite the major protestations of Theo, we decide to go to the Michener Art Museum. We explain that Michener, a well-known novelist and short story writer (famous for writing epic stories of foreign lands) purchased local art in the Doylestown area and then built a museum to house it. Ah, the lives of the rich and famous.

But Michener didn't start out as a rich dude. He was a foundling who was adopted and raised as a Quaker. He then made his own fortune. The stuff of novels.

Theo has a ho hum attitude. How much fun can a museum possibly be? I have to agree. I've been to museums that were not impressive. 

Why I like the Michener Museum:

There is a lovely courtyard filled with statues where you can eat your lunch.

Inside the museum, I spy paintings that make you long for the good old days--fill you with nostalgia.

In one of their many rooms, there's a lovely mural, framed like a window with a view, that tricks you into thinking you are looking at a real view. 

Theo stares and doesn't stare. He looks but does he see? Finally, as we're walking through a deserted part of the collection, we let him down to stretch his cat legs. This is our big mistake. One minute he's looking bored, but harmless; the next, he jumps up onto a display. But not any display. A giant cat perches there. Bigger than life-size.

Now Theo is interested. Unfortunately, he's in a museum where there's a firm look but don't touch policy. 

"Theo. Get down from there."

He doesn't.

"Theo. Don't touch that statue."

He is only sniffing.

"Theo, if you knock down that statue . . ." The threat hangs in the air. 

Finally he jumps down and looks at me as if I'm the crazy one. 

"You are exhausting," I tell him.

He wanders away from me and ends up, exhausted himself, on a bench. I join him. There is a lovely face of a sunflower. I can't resist the urge to pose. Yes, this is my exhausted face. 

Dan poses next to a most unusual door.

All in all, the museum is pretty cool.  My opinion, not Theo's.

Theo and Woody the Woodpecker

 We decide on a whim to visit the Peace Valley Park in Pennsylvania and join a weekly guided morning walk that takes us over a bridge, beside a lake and along a trail. You feel as if you're being absorbed into nature. 

Our guide is Kelly, a naturalist. I confide in Theo as we're walking along that I feel as if I'm deaf and blind to the nature that surrounds us. I see it, but I can't really see it. Kelly points to some of the earliest buds that have arrived with spring--lovely pink flowers--that sit on a nearby branch. I would have walked by and missed them.

Kelly points to the tiniest flowers, native flowers, on the ground along the trail that I would have passed by and never noticed. She talks about them--their name, the fact that these perennials bloom around this time every April. 

Mallard ducks swim by us in Galena Lake. We stop, and I have to squint to see them at all. To notice them. They are swimming in the distance. Two or three of them. I hear nothing. I imagine the water is lapping around them as they glide through. 

Way out into the lake, we see what first appear to be only rocks jutting out from the water. And then, with Kelly's guidance, we see turtles sunbathing on the rocks. 

We spot a sun bathing turtle closer by:

 

All the things we don't notice. All the things we don't know. For example, Kelly refers to David Attenborough's (a world famous biologist and natural historian) discovery that in nature plants and insects use different kinds of signals to communicate with each other: chemical signals, electrical signals and even vibrations. For example, a flower will let a bee know whether it has any pollen or nectar available or if the bee should fly by and try another flower. I never knew the flower was telling the bee anything. I assumed it was a hit or miss situation. 

The group moves slowly along. Kelly stops so we can look around us and feel the peace that emanates from the trees. We've been carrying Theo with us, but now he's itching to get down and explore so we let the group of hikers move ahead of us as we deliberately lag behind. 

We are following a trail and give Theo strict instructions to stay on the trail. Do not wander off. As we're explaining to Theo why it's important to respect the forest around us (ie. don't trample on the flowers and plants), sawdust or pieces of bark begin to float down from a nearby tree. 

We look up. I see nothing, but Kelly has doubled back and easily explains that we are witnessing a woodpecker building his home, meticulously widening the hole that he will live in. The floating things in the air are a kind of tree shavings.

As I'm wondering to myself--gosh, is he there--Woody the Woodpecker, Theo leaps from the ground and latches onto the very tree that Woody has claimed as his own. I am astonished that Theo, listening to the conversation, has no trouble spotting the Woodpecker, no trouble deciding that he wants to climb that tree.

"Wait," I cry out.

Theo reaches out his front right paw, eager to hitch his way up. His gaze is laser focused on the top branches. I wonder if Theo can sniff Woody from where he is. With lightning speed Theo advances up the tree--one feet up, two feet up. He pauses.

"Theo, what are you doing?"

Theo doesn't answer. He never answers. Cats have this way of becoming insulated in their world. Once they make a decision, come hell or high water, they are going to follow through.

I used to watch Chuckie do the same thing. He'd be lounging around outside, spot a squirrel, and no matter what happened next . . . if I lunged towards him, called out his name to stop, it was as if he couldn't hear me. 

I pray for a miracle. I have several fears. Theo will engage in a territorial fight with Woody. Or he will climb up, change his mind, and be stuck up there. 

Suddenly, more tree chips float down, seemingly aimed directly at Theo's face. I can't believe what I see--Theo stops and uses his right paw to swipe at his face, his eyes. He blinks several times. Woody has amazingly good aim.

"Theo," I whisper.

He begins his slow descent down the tree--half climbing, half sliding. His front paws hold him in place as he allows himself to slip down. Then he jumps. 

It's at moments like these that I am torn--should I hug him or kill him?

"Theo." I am disappointed in his behavior. But feeling sorry that he's struggling to clean the sawdust out of his eye.

"I only wanted to sniff him, mom." 

Am I being played by a gangster?

Home Again with a Gangster (Cat)

 Yeah! We're finally back home. Theo is re-united with his two rascal siblings Sienna and Mico (Michelangelo). As usual, unless they're eating, they're up to no good.

Their three cat heads are together. The room is exceedingly quiet which can mean only one thing. They're hatching some kind of plot. What do they want? Other than general mischief (which they call "playing") and "sniffing" the world around them, it's always the same thing--more food, more snacks, or the water fountain re-filled. 

Theo is the ringleader. Although he may be a bit snarky on the road, he is the gentlest of cats at home. He takes his job as big bro very seriously. He sees himself as a role model for the younger hooligans.

 But, even he's not immune to their antics. He's always watching. Somehow he gets drawn in.

If Mico is zooming around the house from living room to den, up and then down the stairs, careening around the corner towards the kitchen, jumping on chairs and then off chairs, Theo won't be too far behind. Where do they get all the energy?

If Mico jumps on the dining room table, spies the lovely basket filled with fruit (wooden fruit--so what's the attraction), and begins using his paw as a baseball bat, smacking the fruit out of the basket and onto the table, and then onto the floor . . . Theo will be right there--smacking the fruit with him. It's gotten so bad, we now have to put Saran Wrap around the basket to keep the fruit where it belongs.

Sometimes Mico is still. But his face tells you he's always thinking.

If Sienna is poised on the banister on the second floor that overlooks the dining room, then Theo is transfixed--can he jump up also and oh so precariously balance himself? Danger beckons. Once or twice Sienna slips, her paw dangling in mid-air, but she rights herself. We're afraid to approach her, afraid we'll spook her and she will lose her balance. 

We expect Theo to do the right thing. Meow at her to come down. 

"Why would I do that, mom?" he asks. 

"Because she's your sister and she might slip off and slam against the dining room table and break a leg or worse," I respond in even tones.

But Theo is Theo. A cat. He sees the world through a cat's eyes. He sums up the danger, the risk of possibility, and stands firm. On little cat paws. 

I reconsider. Will she tumble off to her death? Am I being over-concerned? Am I over-thinking? 

The night before last, Sienna is posed on our larger than life brown lounge chair, at the very top, her body kind of slanted with the pull of gravity. She's clearly catnapping. And she slips and is midway between falling to the floor or righting herself. I don't know how she does it. She saves herself in the end and, of course, returns to the exact same position. Theo barely blinks an eye.

His opinion--she knows what she's doing. She wasn't born yesterday. 

Then Mr. Squirrel appears. On our patio. Looking for an acorn that I guess he's hidden in the hibiscus tree in the planter. The hibiscus is on its last legs. Mr. Squirrel jumps up, smells something and starts digging. Dirt goes flying. Utterly intent on his job, he doesn't notice the three faces staring at him. 

Then the protective instincts of the three hooligans kick in. Sienna takes the lead. She bangs her paw against the screen. The squirrel doesn't budge. He is close to the acorn now and nothing is going to deter him.

Mico lets out a screech that I have absolutely never heard before. Yes, he sounds like he's being murdered. And he scares himself--he scoots backwards, slams against the sofa, and in a genuine state of panic, sets off across the room. Looking for safety? He disappears.

Suddenly the other two mesmerized cats unfreeze themselves and race after Mico as if their lives depend upon it.

Sienna runs upstairs and poses on a chair. Theo hides under the guest room bed. Where's Mico? Upstairs, underneath a chair in his comfy bed.

Meanwhile Mr. Squirrel finally unearths his acorn and holds it in his paws like a crowned jewel, totally oblivious to the ruckus he has caused. Fifteen minutes later, Theo and Sienna are fast asleep on a chair upstairs. 

And life goes on.  

Birgu--for Theo the snack capital of Malta

 Theo, Dan and I love our time in Malta. We travel to Birgu (Maltese name) or Vittoriosa (Italian name), an ancient fortified city on the southern side of the Grand Harbor that dates back to medieval times. 

Birgu has a fascinating history. A diversity of people have lived there--the Phoenicians, the Greeks, the Romans, the Byzantines, the Angevines, and the Aragonese, and remnants of their culture still exist, but the most influential people who arrived was the Order of St. John. This Catholic Military Order built Birgu. 

Why was the Order of St. John in Birgu and why did it frankly exist at all?

The Order of St. John was a papal order founded in the 12th century, honoring John the Baptist, charged with defending the Holy Land. This fact floored me. The Order hired knights, and they fought in the Crusades until 1291. This is the background about the Crusades that I knew little about. I have read about the Crusades but wondered how were they formed? The Order has a complicated history, but essentially in 1526 the Order was driven out of Rhodes, a Greek island, and sent to Malta. When they arrived, they built three cities--Birgu was one of them, and it became important because of its prime location near the harbor where it could defend against invaders. 

During the Great Siege of Malta the Order of St. John with 500 knights and 6,000 foot soldiers repelled a four month siege from the Ottomans. Birgu was on the front lines protecting the Maltese Islands from attack.

That is one of the reasons why Birgu is so fascinating. The buildings date back to the 1500's, with plaques that share their historic significance. The town itself is quaint and inviting, with narrow streets . . .

 

romantic balconies . . 

beautiful doors . . .

 

intriguing door handles . . .

and plaques that hint at the history. This plaque identifies the Church of St. George used by the Rhodians back in the 1500's. The Rhodians were the people who followed the Order of St. John to Malta when they were kicked out of Rhodes.

For me, it's all about the details. 

Theo cares nothing for this. He is with us, but I wonder is he really with us. Mindfulness? What is going through his cat brain? He is pouty, has no interest in doorhandles or narrow quaint streets. 

Plan B for us with a pouty cat is SNACKS. They become the bribe that Theo can't resist. We walk down the charming streets of Birgu. And Theo eats snacks. And more snacks. 

And more snacks.

Enough. 

In all honesty, we finally give up. Theo becomes interested only once when we lift him up to sniff a door knocker in the shape of--you guessed it--a fish. He sniffs and sniffs. 

Finally it's time for lunch and Theo is all in. Unbelievable.