Excerpt: Transcendental Meditation in Coraopolis, PA

Sam sat on the edge of the porch at the step and watched the huge moths buzz and bounce around the light bulb. “You know, you could keep those moths away with a yellow bug light.”

“And deprive myself of the fun of watching those things kill themselves? Are you kidding?” Simon laughed.

A pile of fur flashed over Sam’s head, coming from the rafters towards the bulb, enjoined with a hearty “RrrrrEEee-urrrr!” The animal pounded against the bulb, and clawed its way onto the cedar shingles, keeping a hold with three feet while a fourth, its forepaw, batted furiously at the frantic moths.

“Get ‘em, Rufus! Get ‘em!” shouted Simon at an absolutely huge white Maine Coon cat now scrabbling on the wall and shoveling a flitting hairy moth the size of Sam’s thumb into its maw.

Rufus hung long enough to sate his malevolent moth appetite, then he spun sideways and let his momentum carry him off the wall and onto the porch. He almost immediately sighted a tree frog on the sidewalk, about three feet from the porch, and leapt into action, claws flying. The last Sam saw of the cat was a tumbling long-haired white blur, rolling over its own tail, and a frog—arms and legs akimbo—directly over the cat’s outstretched paws.

The adversaries rolled out of the cone of light from the porch and into darkness. Sam watched where he last saw them, listening as closely as he could.

“Ribbet!”

“RrrrrEEee-urrrr!”

“Rib-crunch.”

Sometimes being totally in the moment could be less than warm and comfy.

“Yes!” said Simon. “And another one bites the dust.” He reached over to what Sam had thought was a cribbage board and moved the peg up a notch. Rufus +1, adversaries - still at zero.