If you've been reading this blog for the past few years, you know I love Marlee. Sometimes, though, she exasperates me: There are some things I simply can't get her to do. I mean, I know she doesn't have opposable thumbs and, well, she's a cat. But still...
I just hope that if she reads this, she doesn't think that I wish she were Marilyn. She's writing a memoir, "Calico Cycles," about her trip around the US. So far she's traveled over 10,000 miles in 32 states since last May and has seen a lot--from the basket of a bicycle.
Now, in case Marlee thinks I'm judging her for not writing, I'll remind her of what I've said before: Writing skills are not a sign of intelligence or any kind of worth. (Why do you think Socrates never wrote?) But, you know, Marlee babe, I tried taking you on rides and almost lost you.
You do have an excuse: I didn't start training you early enough. Marilyn's human, Caleb Werntz, started when she was two months old. You, Marlee, were six months old when you came into my life, and you were born on the street, so perhaps it was too late, or you had (and possibly still have) PTSD from your previous life.
Anyway, Werntz, who hails from Portland (where else?) "got her a harness and leash and put her in the front basket" and took her for her first "training ride" nine years ago. He says that she's slept through most of the journey (Is something a journey if you sleep through it?) but she was nonetheless able to "write" her diary, which he's "translating."
(That might be the hardest part of all: Translating is never easy. I know: I've done it, mostly badly.)
It sounds a bit like a role-reversed "Travels With Charley," although I don't know whether Marilyn is "in search of America, as Steinbeck was--or, for that matter, whether she's read Steinbeck.
Caleb has begun a Kickstarter campaign to raise funds so he can raise money to "promote and distribute" copies of the travel diary. I can forgive Marlee for not knowing how to do that: I've never taught her to use the Internet!
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