Dear Claire:

I hope the Feng Shui Ninja don't come get you should you ever divulge their reversal secret. And I've wanted to tell you so many times how much you have changed and how peaceful you have become--you have a new wa. However you achieved it is acceptable to me.

Your letter about the dying geese came the same day I found Stretch's body. I didn't actually find his body, just some bloody feathers that I recognized. And I also found Bobcat tracks. I have just purchased a Bobcat trap. Stretch's harem is nearly inconsolable, as chickens go, running around cackling and looking for him. But they still eat, grief-stricken or no. Chickens are so defenseless, especially when they sleep. They were roosting on the ladder I leaned up against the shed for them, and the Bobcat just snatched Stretch down and ate him. He could have eaten all of them in their sleep because, when they sleep, they are really unconscious. Perhaps they were all dreaming they were geese in China.

Poor Stretch. He was my favorite rooster. When you raise chickens, you begin to think of them as pets. I've raised too many roosters. The Arracona rooster, Emperor Number Two, has realized Stretch is no longer around and is trying to acquire his harem. But Stretch was a big, fine Rhode Island Red, not a South American pretty boy. The hens may know the difference.

Finally I have outlasted Jessie, and the Empress is asleep on the floor. Thank heaven. Jessie thinks that I am never done taking care of what she perceives to be her needs and I perceive to be her wants. And she certainly never considers that I might need some time to myself. I believe she thinks she was born to rule. I can see why Paregoric was outlawed. I can also see that when Jessie is 17, this place is going to be stacked from floor to ceiling with old, broken, dusty toys. She won't let me get rid of anything that is hers, no matter what condition it is in. She acts like it is a piece of the ark. She once followed me out on the porch and retrieved the bottom portion of her toy weed eater, the handle long since broken off, with an "Oooo, weee" that denoted total reverence. And since I didn't want to appear to be a dragon-lady type mother and since I couldn't figure out how to explain broken and no good, I let her bring it back in.

Several days ago, Hooch had one of his gorgeous jaw teeth extracted, the size of the iceberg that sunk the Titanic, due to a lingering complication of rattlesnake bite. I guess in a few months I'll have to get him a little partial plate--at least that's what the vet said, who recognizes a whacko animal mental case when he sees one. Now Hooch is lying on the sofa, which I've made up into a lovely little hospital bed. I know that everybody thinks their dog is Rin-Tin-Tin, but Hooch really is.

Jessie fell asleep on the floor a little while ago and woke up like a grizzly poked by a sharp stick. What a mean little girl. Everything I have done since she woke up has been wrong. I just stopped her from painting on her blackboard with a straw full of coke. She thinks of the most bizarre things to do. Day before yesterday, she opened the bathroom door and got the bottle of bleach and water that I use to clean the tubs and sprayed the cushions on the sofa. The sofa was already ruined by un-declawed cats, but whatever possessed her to do such a thing? Before I could discover what she had done with the bottle I had just wrested from her, she closed the sliding closet door on her thumb, and while I was carrying her around comforting her, I kept smelling bleach. But I failed to notice that her jeans and her red socks were getting lighter and lighter, and so were the sofa cushions.

While I was mixing up the Nutri-system Hot Cocoa and Whipped Topping (very good), Jessie got in the cat room and mixed up about ten cups of cat food in their water bowl. I lost it and swatted her on her bottom a few times, but not enough to make her cry. Then, while I was trying to clean up the awful mess, she was standing around holding out her hands looking all distressed because they had wet cat food on them. She can't stand for her hands to have anything on them. You should see how she acts if she gets sand or a dead bug on her hands. Irene Reilly was right when she said, "Mothers is got a hard road."

Now she keeps telling me "We go," and she is wearing her sunglasses and standing with her hands on her hips, which means that she wants to go somewhere, but I do not. She has also taken to admonishing me with her finger when she wants to really play empress. At first I thought, "What a bossy thing for a child to do." Then I realized that I do it to her when I am really serious about what I don't want her to do. Of course, after she wags it at me a few times during one of her trying moments, I want to grab her by it and sling her around my head. She also does it to the cats and the teddy bear.

Jessie just took another short nap and we are both refreshed.

A few weeks ago I had the truck re-shod. I bought the super redneck mudslinger deluxes with big words outlined in white. I found wires the length of curb feelers sticking out of my old tires. It's a good thing I got the mudslingers, because that's what we have here, now. The rain here has been torrential. Four inches last night, 12 inches this week, 8 inches last week. Some areas are being evacuated due to flooding. The water is lying over our place like a sheet of glass, and we are luckier than most people. Most people can't get in and out of their houses. Allyson has gotten stuck pulling out of her drive in a dually one ton pick-up. Kris can't pull off the lime rock road into the pasture to go around a group of heifers staging a sit-in demonstration.

We are expecting another 5 to 8 inches if the tropical storm does not reach hurricane proportions. The local news here is a trip; all the Nawtheners (read Yankees) barking and whining about high water. Almost anybody except Nawtheners knows not to buy a place with cypress trees in the front yard. If people are determined to live in a place that God intended to be a swamp, then they should be prepared to contend with high water. And it is pouring down outside as we speak. I think I just saw one of the chicken pens floating past the back door. Write soon.