Before I go further, I should tell you that the ending is happy. But it made me think a bit. (I can hear all you smart-alecks right now: “Think? A professor? When did this start?” Just shut up, all right? I'll have you know that I think on a daily basis. In fact, I think I'll have a beer right now, just to prove how thoughtful I am. So there.)
The interesting thing about our two cats is that they're not all that interesting. In many ways, they're more like gerbils. They hardly purr, they hardly cuddle, they hardly do anything except poop and sleep. And they're afraid of almost everything—especially monsters, which come in many forms: loud noises, strange cats, strange humans, vacuum cleaners (of course), and wealthy politicians. (OK, I made that last one up. I'm the one who's scared of politicians. But the cats ought to be scared of them.)
Nevertheless, we love our cats; we found that out Friday. The gray one has been sick, and we needed to take her to the vet for a shot. But we were also on the last day before we headed to New Zealand. (I sometimes think that pets plan these things. “Oh, they're going on a trip, huh? And they can barely afford it? Perfect! I'll eat some grass, barf on the rug, and then keel over barely breathing so they'll have to rush me to the vet and spend $750 to find out I'm actually healthy. Then they won't have the money to buy the tickets for Wizarding World. Heh, heh. Serves 'em right.”)
Anyway, we had scheduled the day carefully. Carpet cleaners at ten, house cleaners after that, vet at 2:30. We would (try to) put the cat in the carrier at 2:00, to be sure that we had enough time to catch her.
Only the house cleaners showed up at 1:55 and promptly plugged the vacuum in. So both cats dashed outside. Then the gardeners arrived with their leaf blower. It was the perfect storm of monsters.
Now anybody who has ever been owned by a cat knows that Harry Potter's invisibility cloak has nothing on cats. When a feline wants to hide, it will vanish into thin air. You can look in all the favorite spots, you can call it, you can put food out, you can even pretend not to care. It doesn't matter. The Air Force really screwed up when they spent a billion dollars on the B-1 stealth bomber. If they had simply put a cat in the pilot seat of a Cessna, all the enemy fighters in the world wouldn't have been able to find it.
2:10. No cat. 2:15. Still no cat. 2:20. We call the vet, who generously tells us they close at 6, just bring her over when you find her. 3:00. No cat.
At this point I should mention that this particular cat is not what you'd call smart. In fact, calling her stupid would be a compliment. She normally wanders around the house, trying to remember where the food is. If she encounters a half-open door, instead of pulling it open with her paw like a normal cat, she stands up against it, dog-fashion, latching it irreversibly shut. Stupid? She's so dumb she could be a politician. Well, almost.
So I'm really ticked that she has outsmarted me.
3:30. No cat. 4:00. We go over to the neighbors for a farewell drink. Surely the cat will get over her fear and return while we're gone, right? Riiiiiiight.
I'll spare you the blow-by-blow. At 5:30, I phoned the vet and rescheduled for Saturday (praise be to all vets who are open on weekends!). At 10:00, I called the cats for dinner. The gray one is a pig; she is always right there at the first hint of food. Not this time.
That's when I realized how illogical we can be about our pets. We were due to leave—for a year—in less than 24 hours, and our cat—our non-cuddling, non-purring, disastrously stupid cat—was missing. What to do? Obviously, one of us would have to stay behind until she was found. How much would it cost to change the ticket? $2000? $3000? How much hassle would it be to live in our now-empty house, waiting for the cat to come back? How long would we wait before we gave up and admitted that she would never return? How come I couldn't hear the snickering just outside my door, as the danged cat relished my agony and punished me for having hired the monsters in the first place?
But finally, just after midnight, I looked up and there she was, busily munching on the food I had left out. “Who, me? Is there something wrong?”
No, my darling cat. Nothing at all. I'm just relieved that I'm not going to fly to New Zealand full of guilt for letting my cat die.
And I'm going to ask the vet to use the biggest needle he has.
No comments:
Post a Comment