Last year as winter approached, we found tiny abandoned babies along the shore when we went for our evening walk.

We’d be chatting, and then I’d hear a cry. Was it a bird? We’d pause, step back and listen and there, night after night, was another small, cold, hungry kitten. The first one was under a bridge and all alone. The next night there was another cry from along the shore, quite a distance from the first. The third cried out from the brush along the road. Another one turned up under a bush in our garden.

It was cold and it was raining kittens. Tiny kittens, only about four weeks old. Cold, loud and hungry. Calling out for their mama.

But they found us, and I carried them home. The girl looked up at me from under the bridge and straight into my eyes. I clambered down the bank to the rocks and she waited for me to pick her up. The others, the males, were more nervous and scurried away and hid under rocks and bushes so that it took a few days to grab them.

We found homes for two of them and kept two. Stella and Marlon. These two kittens took all my energy. Feeding them every few hours, washing them with warm, wet cloths, teaching them how to use the cat box. It was care of a newborn, tiring and joyful.

They grew into grey fluffballs that followed me around the house. If I was scrubbing a floor, they were there. If I was doing yoga, they were on either side of the mat. They played with the clothes on the drying rack, they jumped into the laundry basket. They were always watching me. They chased each other around and slept in a pile of matching fluffy grey fur.

They made me smile, lifted my spirits. Created love.

Most of the mandates have been lifted and we have an income again, but I am finding this winter very hard. Every new week reminds me of last year and I feel my heart creak and strain. I do not feel safe. I am still struggling to comprehend the devastation to our society.

I wondered what the Old Bitch Above would do to distract me. I wondered if more kittens would fall from heaven and fill my heart with love, but so far only one scraggly six month old cat has adopted us, quite the character with his entitled attitude about food and his place on the couch.

I began this blog in the spirit of honesty and transparency. I called the blog, Painfully About Me, because I knew it would be. I wrote about whatever I wanted, and I still do. Sometimes light, sometimes heavy.

Over the last few years I have honestly described who I am and how the mandates and other changes to our society have affected me. I know there are those who feel like I do. And I know we need to hear from each other.

I have been honest, but there is always more truth to tell. I have a thorn in my heart, and one that I don’t want to talk about. It is the distance between me and my vaccinated children. I feel the distance, and I fear for their health.

I am a mother. My instinct is to care for my children and I fear the unknown effects of the MRNA shot.

I don’t blame them for wanting to participate in the proffered world. I know it must feel easier to believe the authorities have our best interest in mind.

I am living with this fear, it is part of my nervous system. In order to continue to live and breathe, I remind myself that I have no control over anything and cannot protect my children forever.

I find it is difficult to feel light hearted, and I see from people’s faces that I am not alone there. However, I am very fortunate to have the Old Bitch Above looking after me.

OBA was my mom’s version of god, you will remember. A moody and unpredictable god that follows your life about as carefully as I follow Coronation Street, which is not very carefully. But still, she has an eye on you and will punish or reward as she feels fit.

The Old Bitch Above has been watching me struggle, it seems, and decided I could use some love, She offered me the chance to babysit a a tiny girl for a few days a week.

The little girl has a cheerful nature, she is a bright spirit. She is a lot like my first child was at two years old, wise beyond her years, articulate and sensitive. Always laughing and finding joy.

The tiny child enters our home with confidence, crying out ‘hello’ before she is even in the house. She knows she is loved. She knows nothing but love, I think. She is brave and pure.

I always say to her, ‘who is the sweetest little girl in the world’, and she smiles happily.

As I hand her my childhood eggcups that she plays with every visit and she settles into her high chair for a snack, I always ask,

‘Why did I paint this old wooden high chair white and put it in the corner of my kitchen? Was that for you? I thought I was making a plant holder, but I must have known you were coming. It must have been for you’.

‘ And why did I buy two tiny adorable red chairs a year ago? Did I know you were coming to visit? I must have bought them for you’!

And the little angel just looks at me and smiles knowingly.