When Sarah was a little girl, we started thinking she ought to have a pet. At first we thought a hamster would be nice, but really, what can you do with a hamster? We'd already gotten a fish tank and that was kind of peaceful, situated as it was in my office in the basement, but again, fish are slimy and very impersonal. Plus it always made me nervous when they started swimming on their sides. Death and dying was a constant companion when it came to fish, and I didn't want to introduce too much trauma in young Sarah's life.
One Halloween night, we went to Mr. Blakeslee's house for treats. Mr. Blakeslee taught Sarah swimming lessons in the summer, and he always showed up at the door on Halloween with a funny costume. That particular Halloween night in 2001, while Mr. Blakeslee was making faces at Sarah from behind a goofy mask, his wife came out with a small caramel-colored kitten and tried to put it into Sarah's plastic pumpkin. Hello? Was this within the normal etiquette of trick or treating? Sarah's little blue eyes brightened up, but fortunately the kitten would have nothing to do with being crammed into a plastic pumpkin and he flexed his little kitten toes so the claws came out. We all laughed nervously.
We went home and talked about it, and we called Mrs. Blakeslee and said we decided to take the kitten. When I went to pick it up, the nervous little ninny climbed up my chest and over my shoulder, digging his young, sharp claws into my skin, hanging upside down, his claws like those mountain climber's hooks sunk into my flesh. When Mr. Blakeslee pulled him off of me, I had long, red, itchy welts. This was not starting off well.
But Sarah named him Carmel, for his color. Carmel hid behin the washing machine for weeks, trembling in the dark, his eyes glowing like he was posessed, hissing when we tried to pry him out with a broom. He did come out when we weren't looking, for a bite to eat and to use the litter box. But I swear that cat has some sort of nervous tic, you have to be careful not to startle him or he might become catatonic. No pun intended.
A year later, Sarah's piano teacher died suddenly. It was Sarah's first experience with death and grief. The teache had had four large cats, one of whom would walk across the piano keys when Sarah was trying to play. The others just decorated the couch. Larry and I decided that it might help Sarah through this loss to adopt one of the cats. So that's how we got Scooter, a beautiful black Persian with flourescent greenish yellow eyes. When we brought home 6 year old Scooter, he stayed hidden behind the piano for weeks. We knew his owner had treated him and his housemates to tuna water, so we tried using that to coax him out from behind the piano. We even played him CDs of classical piano music to comfort him in his loss. Nothing worked. Meanwhile, Mr. Blakeslee informed us that Carmel's mother had another litter (that woman got around!) and asked if we'd be interested. At first, of course, we said no. But one day Sarah was over at their house being babysat by Mr. Blakeslee's daughter, and when we came to pick her up, we saw the litter. Sarah fell in love with a tiny, fluffy gray kitten that fit into the palm of Larry's hand. When she showed him to me, I melted. We brought him home, and I got to name him. We'd all read the Harry Potter books with great intensity by then, and so I named the kitten Dobby, after the house elf in the Potter books.
After awhile, Scooter was curious about this tiny kitten and came out from behind the piano to check him out. Carmel seemed to sense that this tiny gray furball was his relation, because he took it upon himself to protect him. He curled his body around his little half-brother when they took their naps. He was always there by Dobby, like a protective big brother. We took pictures.
Though Scooter came out and showed himself, he would not get too close. He'd come up on the couch to be petted, but only on his terms. He would sit a whole cushion away and you had to stretch your arm out to pet him. He refused to get any closer, much less come up on anyone's lap.
Then that awful night that I opened a window to air out the bedroom, let a little fresh air in, not realizing there was no screen in the window. Scooter and Dobby both bolted for the window and jumped out into the backyard. Larry and I found them under the deck and laid in the grass doing all we could to coax them out and back into the house. I was heartbroken. We left food on the porch, hoping to grab them when they ate. Dobby was out there a week before Larry was able to grab him at the cat food dish. But Scooter wouldn't be caught. He was out there three weeks and we'd begun to give up on getting him back. Finally one night, the babysitter grabbed him and held on despite his protesting back claws and devil-like screeches. I hadn't warmed up to Scooter at that point-- I took it a little personally that he wouldn't accept us.
But after he came home-- or was dragged home, rather-- he changed. He was suddenly very affectionate! He crawled up on our laps and let us pet him. He started nudging our hands, insisting on being petted on the head. He hung out with Dobby and Carmel, snuggled up to their bodies for group naps.
Since then, we've put them through four moves, one of those moves being across country from Pennsylvania to Nebraska. That was not pretty. We thought Nervous Ninny Carmel would never recover from that 3-day car trip in the cat carrier. He sat completely still in the back of the carrier, staring. He didn't eat, he didn't drink, he didn't poop. While the other two meowed constantly, moaning, wailing, Carmel seemed--dare I say it again-- catatonic. By the end of the trip, Scooter and Dobby had litter and poop and pee all mangled up in their fur, cat food all over their cages, mixed up with the catfood, even though we cleaned them out every day of the trip. it was like they just threw royal hissy fits like spoiled little girls. But Carmel just froze. We occasionally put a finger in front of his nose to see if he was still breathing.
Now we're in our last house, we hope, in their lifetimes. For all the trauma they've apparently suffered, they seem to be adjusting. Carmel's still a bit nervous, but if you accept him as he is and just wait, he'll come and curl up on your lap and let you pet him. He comes to you on his terms. Dobby is our cuddler. He sleeps with me, gives me chest massages (or breast exams?), nuzzles my face when I'm trying to read, or curls up behind my knees when I'm sleeping. Scooter, well, he has a problem. He suffers from addiction. Every once in awhile, we hear him begin to howl mournfully. When it first started, we were alarmed that maybe he was sick or had a bellyache. But when he starts to howl, we check on him, and sure enough, he emerges with a pen in his mouth. I don't know if he gets high off the ink smell or what. But he just howls when he has one between his teeth. Every once in awhile, we've learned it's best to move the couch, because that's where he keeps his stash. He also has a thing for bathroom cups. Sometimes we hear an echo in his howling, and we know he's got a cup between his teeth. But we started finding bathroom cups all over the house, behind the couch, under the recliner, in the laundry room.
But they're family. They make us laugh, they snuggle up to us when we're having a bad day, and Dobby in partcular makes me feel like I'm the most wonderful human in the world. We've been through a lot together. We have stories on them to embarrass their girlfriends if they ever had any, and they won't because of course they're inside cats. Scooter is 14 now, and I sometimes worry about him. He can sleep so soundly and still that I often nudge him to make sure he's still breathing. Other times when he's sleeping at the foot of the bed I can hear him snoring, and it's almost as loud as Larry's snoring. I get tired of picking up Dixie cups and searching for lost pens. But I love them, they're my boys. Losing one of them would be like losing a family member-- I hate to think of it. They've wrapped their furry paws around my heart. So I forgive them when they throw up on one of the new rugs, or leave traces of cat litter on the coffee table, or leave tumbleweeds of black, gray or caramel colored fur floating along the floorboards. They keep my feet warm at night, they comfort me and love me when the world is cold, and they remind me that this is home, and everything will be alright-- as long as we're together.
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