a book for shutting people up like telescopes...

cats and mirrors, budgies and mirrors, these are things to be watched. cats seem endlessly perplexed when they reach the edge and the other cat disappears. but budgies simply attack. it isn't clear if it's an amorous attack. love me! or just an attack. maybe it is seeing something it imagines looks similar to itself and thinks, "this can't go on! unbearable!" and tries to eviscerate it. i suppose this is how most creatures use mirrors. but the real flummox comes when the creature tumbles through the glass. or is shoved through the glass. or doesn't even see the glass.

when i was about seven we began seeing a neighborhood prowler. once, around dusk, i was playing in my neighbor's back yard. she was much older. she liked to play pranks. she yelled, "the prowler! right behind you!" and i believed her and i ran as fast as i could to the door. it was a glass door. the door was closed. glass doors always look the same. so i ran right into it. and it shuddered the length and a goose egg formed on my forehead and i saw stars. just like in the cartoons. only it hurt. that's the trouble with glass doors.

it's also sometimes worthwhile to watch creatures watch other creatures use mirrors. very difficult to tell where one begins and the other ends and which creatures are mirror creatures and which creatures are mere creatures.