Yesterday I went to yet another specialist and as I was leaving I did one of those mental forehead smacks and thought, hey, I’ve got four bucks in my pocket, why go right home when there’s a Starbucks next door? In just a few minutes, some 20-something Barista could be whipping me up a decaf latte with soy milk and I could be soothing away the memory of yet another person with letters after their name telling me there’s nothing wrong with me when my body keeps telling me otherwise.
Then, for some weird brain-bending reason, going for a grown-up treat after a doctor’s appointment made me think not of the lollipop after the childhood injection (that’s a story for another blog), but about a cat I used to have in Boston. We found each other when I saw a flyer posted in one of those 24/7 marts in Cleveland Circle advertising “Free kittens to good home.” At the time I lived in a studio apartment with a parakeet, two doves, and a man who was a serious control freak. I mean serious. I mean serious to the point of causing his girlfriends to develop eating disorders serious. I had some doubts as to whether this would qualify as a “good home,” but I needed a friend and ally, someone who would be glad to see me when I came home from work no matter what the hour, someone who wouldn’t scold me for buying the wrong brand of peanut butter. I chose a black tabby and named him Phineas. The woman loaned me a wicker basket to take him home on the subway.
The man I lived with took a shine not to the kitten but to the basket, and wouldn’t let me return it to the woman who’d loaned it to me, and I was young and cowed enough to obey him. The cat, however, didn’t. Phineas must have known in his little kitty heart that this was a bad man. I should have listened. Among other points of contention between us, he and I had major disagreements on how a cat should be raised. I know every feline has his or her own nature, but I think about eighty percent of how a cat turns out has to do with care and environment. Love given equals love returned (At least where pets are concerned. People are much more complicated). All of the cats I’d raised “from scratch” (all of two) had grown into loving, affectionate, loyal adults. This is what I’d planned for Phinny. Turns out my boyfriend had other ideas. He thought cats should be raised like dogs, and over the next few months, proceeded to yell, shove, smack and scold all the affection right out of the poor thing. Then, fortunately, the guy got a job that took him on the road about three weeks out of the month. But Finny didn’t catch on right away. He developed nervous tics. He followed me around the apartment as I got ready for work in the morning, clawing at my ankles, as if to say, “don’t leave me alone with him.” He had some kind of feline version of agoraphobia, and was afraid to leave the apartment. (maybe he was afraid to leave me alone with him) So, lacking the money for a cat carrier, I’d put him in a cardboard box to get him out the door. Then, because he was also claustrophobic, as soon as we got out, he had to be outside of the box, riding on my shoulder. My big mistake (besides not kicking this guy out on his ass) was that the first time I did this was to take him to the vet to have him neutered. I worked it out with the vet that I’d drop Phinny off on my way to work and pick him up on my way home. So in the morning I put him into the box, we got on the subway, he got out and started climbing up my coat to my shoulder. But something scared him. Maybe it was all the people. My feeling was that either he got an inkling of what was going to be done to him, or got hit with one of his many other neuroses.
He sprayed me.
In the middle of a crowded Green Line car, all over my brand new calf-length purple down coat that I’d gotten in Filene’s basement for some ridiculous discount, he let loose, his last chance to exert his feline manhood. Or to mark me as his territory for the rest of my life.
I never got the smell out.
And the difficulty of getting Finny out of the apartment never changed. After that, I tried bringing him to fun places – the Cleveland Circle Reservoir, the Public Gardens, even sitting with me at the Laundromat, hoping he’d want to cuddle up on a warm towel placed next to a dryer while I read – to show him that leaving the house wouldn’t always lead to getting your balls chopped off. But no dice.
It went from bad to worse. One night I had to work until midnight and came home to find a dead parakeet on my threshold. And by the time the guy left me for good, Phinny was so traumatized that I had no choice but to find him a better home. Fortunately, the friend who helped me move owned a large house on an acre of land.
I got reports on his condition from time to time. Phinny remained slightly aloof, but on the whole, was much, much happier for the rest of his life.
So always remember to get your lollipop, your latte, whatever gets you through the rough patches. Then they won’t have to take you out in a box until it’s absolutely necessary.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
When I was living with a girl named Kristy in Syracuse in the early to mid 90s, she decided she wanted a kitten. I didn't; we lived in a second floor apartment over a very busy street in a not particularly great neighborhood and I had then, as always, several thousand books and comics reposing on various rescued from street corners and/or jury rigged sets of shelves around the place (not to mention on the floor and furnishings at any given time). I just couldn't imagine a cat being happy or comfortable there, especially if I were drowning it in the toilet bowl after it scratched up one of my Heinlein novels, or a copy of a 1970s Engelhart AVENGERS comic.
So I said no we can't, and it's a bad idea, and we really shouldn't, and then found myself sitting in the passenger seat as we drove back from an address she'd found in the classifieds, with this tiny little frightened shivering bundle of grey fluff under my coat. "Let's call her Casablanca," I was burbling foolishly as I stroked the baby with one finger between her ears. See, there had been two kittens left, the grey one and an orange tabby, and we picked this one, and I've always preferred the black and white CASABLANCA to the colorized one.
Kristy liked that, because it let us call the kitten Cassie for short. And, as at that period, I was in one of my frequent between-jobs stints, and Kristy was going off to work and to classes every day, I got to stay home and take care of the baby.
The only condition I extracted from Kristy was that if for some reason she and I ever broke up, she had to take Cassie, because my means of support were ever unreliable in my latter years in Syracuse, and I didn't want the kitty to be endangered by my fecklessness. Kristy duly promised, and, well, I quickly grew to adore our new cat.
When Kristy and I did break up (Kristy dumped me for a guy who was, at the time, a close friend of mine, although our friendship didn't survive the shift in social alignment well), she left Cassie with me, declaring that she didn't want me to be all alone. That was okay, but I reiterated to her that if I had to move out of Syracuse for any reason, she'd have to take the baby. She once more agreed, and within days, revealed the real reason she'd wanted to leave Cassie with me... it gave her an excuse to go out and get another kitten, which she promptly did. (Kittens are delightful, I agree; any excuse to bring a new one into the household is a good excuse.)
Around a year and a half later, having run through all my Magic cards that were worth anything and used up all my unEmployment benefits, and having still been unable to find more than a few days temp work moving furniture and loading newspaper bundles onto pallets out of every few weeks, my landlord got tired of subsidizing my worthless existence and tacked an eviction notice to my door. I advised my brothers I needed rescuing, and advised my ex that Cassie did as well... at which point, she began to sulk and whine and caper about how she and Gary didn't have room for another cat and it just wouldn't work out and Cassi was USED to living in my apartment and oh me and oh my.
I had to apply relentless pressure to get her to honor her original promise to me, and her commitment to that long ago kitten, and she didn't honor it for long... Cassie eventually ended up on a farm run by some woman who adopted cats wholesale. Or at least, that's what I was told. It wouldn't shock me to find out she ended up at the pound; Kristy was never one to let sentiment interfere with the convenience of her ongoing existence.
I miss Cassie a great deal; after Kristy moved out, she was the only company I had for a year and a half or so, and waking up in the morning to find her curled up in a ball on the bed next to me was wonderfully reassuring, as were the simple acts that go into taking care of a reasonably healthy, reasonably happy cat. I never had much money during that period, but buying catfood for Cassie always made me feel better about myself.
I hate the fact that she never could possibly have understood why she suddenly had to leave the apartment that had been her whole world up to that point, or what became of me. I feel I let her down terribly. If I could have found a job, any kind of job, I could stayed there and Cassie could have stayed happy. Of course, I'm very very happy in my life right now... but I still miss Cassie, and feel, vaguely, that I failed her utterly and miserably.
Thanks for writing this, Highlander, it really touched me. People (most people) know in their hearts that they eventually will land on their feet, and even though cats can physically do this, it still hurts to leave them. Some of my favorite moments from back then were trucking home from the supermarket with a bag full of Tuna for Cats (five for a dollar) and treating Phinny. Or just sitting and reading with him snuggled into my lap. I miss cats - my husband is allergic - but I have fond memories of having them in my life.
Yeah, our oldest is allergic, so no kittens for us, either. It's a bummer. But Super Drama Teen being able to breathe is an acceptable trade off, I guess. ;)
Post a Comment