Another Cat Story, This One Not So Depressing

When I moved to Cairo I realized that I needed a cat. Well, nobody needs a cat; but David traveled quite a bit and I thought it’d be nice to have a warm purring animal close by. Obtaining one wouldn’t be a big deal because they were everywhere. Feral cats lived in the streets and alleys. We had several living in the stairwell of the building. I could’ve grabbed a kitten from the garbage heap next door—I’d seen them crawling around over there. But David felt that they were probably diseased and wild (having never had a cat, he didn’t realize that a cat’s a cat no matter where it comes from) so he asked around and it turned out that someone at work knew someone who needed to find a home for their young cat, and that’s how we came to have Panache, a dainty year-old Siamese. 

Panache was feeble and petite. She spent most of her time spread out on the pilot on the stove, perched on a transformer, or snoozing in the sun. She spent all her life seeking heat. Her meow was a feckless croak, and she had no personality or sense of fun. She never chased a string or showed an interest in a toy. She felt no affection and gave no affection. Cats have a reputation for being aloof and independent, but she was the most boring and inert cat I’d ever encountered. 

We got transferred to Holland. Transporting an animal from a country like Egypt (open sewage, people in gallabiyahs hanging off buses) to a country like Holland (immaculate, organized, highly civilized) involved a lot of paperwork. Trips to administrative offices, health forms signed by a vet, and permits from both the Egyptian and Dutch bureaucracies—getting all that paperwork ready was a lot of bother. But when we landed in Amsterdam, nobody cared. When I urged the passport official to look at the folder holding her transport papers, he shook his head and gestured for me to move on. Security guards watched from posts throughout Schiphol and I poked my folder toward them, asking who I should see to get her cleared. Some ignored me and some waved me on. In the end, papers unexamined, we simply cruised out the entrance with Panache in her carrier, perched atop our cart full of luggage. I never got over feeling that she was there illegally. 

Fast-forward. We had kids and got busy. Panache was always in the background, eating, sleeping, seeking warmth, and remaining, as always, a pitiful excuse for a cat. 

We came to know a couple, Ann and Eric, at the Anglican church we attended in The Hague. Ann was a writer, so we had that in common; though while she wrote novels about God answering prayer and how faith’ll get you through, I was writing novels about quirky women doing quirky things. Her husband, Eric, was a jovial guy who outfitted commercial fishing boats. Also, they had two kids, as did we. Ann and I got together quite often. We bet on who’d get published first. She won.  

To get the full effect of this story, you have to know about Ann. She was deeply kind, the sort who took soup to friends when they were ill and helped tottering gray women across the street. Always compassionate, always generous. And riding alongside the loving part of her soul was a robust sense of humor, though even when she was making a joke, she was unerringly careful with her words—a trait I respected because quite often the words that fly from my tongue are snide or inappropriate.

When Panache had been with me for seven years, she became sick. She quit eating and she was so weak that she was unable to jump up to her chair in the sun. She’d probably been sick and growing sicker for days and I hadn’t been paying attention. It was that busy time—a two-year-old and a four-year-old—and my cat got sick and I didn’t even notice. Burdened by guilt, I rushed her to the vet, who told me her kidneys were no longer functioning. He advised me to have her put down. 

On Sunday when I went to church, I was still feeling miserable. During the social time after the service, the four of us came together for a chat as the kids ran circles around us. Expecting heartfelt sympathy from Ann, I told her that my cat had died. 

“You could have her stuffed and nobody’d know the difference,” she said.

She immediately slapped her hand over her mouth, her wide eyes revealing horror at what she’d just said. 

I was stunned. And so were Eric and David. 

Then, recalling Panache’s bland lethargy, we all burst into laughter—and I knew I’d never again think about Panache without also thinking of Ann, her faux pas, and the shocked look on her face when she realized that an unpleasant truth had escaped so gracelessly from her usually guarded mouth. Too, I appreciate the irony that the cat who slept twenty-three hours a day and lacked a personality is responsible for such a hilarious moment.

This isn’t Panache. Panache wasn’t this healthy-looking. She was skinnier and her hair wasn’t this fluffy, but the coloring is right.

The Lawson King Cat Story

When I was a child, parents didn’t hover the way my generation of parents did. Back then, unless we had a place to be, my sister, Resi, and I roamed the block freely, starting as soon as we could toddle out of the yard. 

One of our friends was Lawson King, who lived up the street. We played with him often because our parents were friends with his parents, who bickered in the most charming way, interrupting and correcting each other’s stories, getting all puffed up with indignation at being interrupted and corrected, and then breaking out laughing.  

Lawson was a gigantic, rambunctious, and loud boy, who ran around waving toy guns and shouting that he was killing the Krauts (or Germans or Nazis). Once he threw a coffee can filled with rocks at my head and said he was bombing the Germans. 

Though I was young, I saw the incongruity. He’d learned to dislike the Germans from his dad, who’d fought on the American side of the war, while my dad had fought for the Germans—considering this, how could the two men be friends? But they were. I think my father must have encountered a lot of prejudice back then. Maybe he learned to see beyond it. I think if I were him, and I knew some kid up the street was shouting about hating the Germans, I’d have been enraged every day. I wish I’d discussed it with him. I would have appreciated his wisdom concerning tolerance. 

Lawson was my age, but he was more my sister’s friend than mine, mainly because she was a bit of a tomboy while I was timid and small; and I found his size to be intimidating and his booming voice to be unsettling.  

When I was around four years old, he told us that his cat had kittens, so Resi and I went down to his house to see them. They were in a box in the garage, and because the garage door was heavy, the three of us worked together to raise it; only when it was about halfway up, Lawson and Resi had a brief conversation, let go of the door, and ran into the house. I was little and they’d left me holding the weight of that door. I wasn’t strong enough to hold it up, so I dropped it.

Resi and Lawson came back out with his mother, who lifted the door, giving us a view of blood smeared all over the garage floor and kitten heads and paws strewn about. The mother cat wasn’t there. 

I thought I’d killed those kittens by dropping the door on them, which is nonsense. There were only parts of kittens scattered around, not whole squished kitties. But I was four with a four-year-old’s perspective. It was traumatic when I dropped the door and then the kittens were dead. 

To this day when a breeze or waft carries a particular combination of odors—blood, garage, cats—it calls to mind images of that grisly slaughter. 

Years later, as an adult, I was reminiscing with my mother about the Kings. 

“Do you remember when I killed their kittens?” I asked. 

“What are you talking about?” Shocked, she said, “A tom got those kittens. You had nothing to do with it.”

Well, this was upsetting. I’d felt at fault for a major portion of my life, and it wasn’t true. 

“I’ve believed all this time that I’d dropped the door on them.”

“Why didn’t you tell me? I had no idea.”

Say what you will about hovering mothers, but if I knew that one of my kids had seen cat carnage, I would’ve talked to him about it. My mother had simply assumed that I was hunky-dory after seeing bits of dead kitten. I’d been bitter toward Lawson and Resi because they abandoned me that way. And I’d felt so guilty, a killer of cats. After I learned the reality, the incident came into focus. Resi and Lawson must have seen the mess in the garage when we were raising the door, while I was probably squeezing my eyes closed, concentrating on finding strength to help with the weight.

As we grew older new interests came along and Lawson, Resi, and I quit spending time together. Later, when we were adults, he and I ran into each other at the chicken place on Georgia. He was toting a really big baby. He and his wife were divorced. He had no job. He’d tried to get into the army, but they turned him away—which was too bad because being a soldier was what he’d always wanted to do with his life. He said he suffered from depression, and I realized that what I once thought was over-exuberance was most likely bipolarism. 

A few years later, his mother called mine and told her that Lawson had killed himself. 

What a weird and sad story this has turned out to be.

In the Neighborhood

Gina’s middle-aged and has lived with her parents all her life. What I like about her is that she’s different from other people. Developmental problems can be difficult to define, so I have no idea what diagnostic term to apply. While not wildly attractive, outwardly she appears normal. And she’s obviously able to read and reason, and her memory is impressive. 

Whatever her issue is, it manifests in her, absolutely and without pause for thought, saying what she thinks. A person who blurts can make others uncomfortable, and I imagine there’ve been times when people avoided her because of this. But I appreciate her honesty. Someone with no artifice, no manipulation, and no vanity is rare.

Her brother, who lives further up the street, warned me that she’s a talker, and it’s true. I suspect she could go nonstop for an hour. I’m pretty sure she’s been told that she talks too much, and I imagine that she often gets shut down mid-sentence—and this has caused her to talk noticeably fast, and to insert “just real quick” between her words, a quirk that I find amusing, but also poignant, as I take her talking as a sign that she’s lonely and needs attention. 

She drives up and down the cul-de-sac in her golf cart, moving between her house and her brother’s house, and going outside the gate to the mailboxes. She places great importance on fetching the mail, and she helpfully keeps an eye on my porch and texts me when we have a package. A while back she was appalled to see that our postal person left a package addressed to Lilah beside the mailbox. She thought that leaving it sitting out like that was irresponsible, so she picked it up and drove it to Lilah’s door. 

“She was home,” Gina told me, perplexed. “Her car was there and her lights were on, and I could see movement in there. I rang the bell several times. But she didn’t come to the door.”

“What did you do?” I asked. 

“I decided to take it to her the next day. I kept an eye out, and when I saw her turn into her driveway, I went back over there, but her garage was already closed. And she still didn’t answer her door, so I left it on her porch.”

I could tell her feelings were hurt. While I don’t know why Lilah didn’t come to the door, it’s understandable that Gina’s background would lead her to believe that Lilah didn’t want to talk to her. Lilah might have had earbuds in or something. Nevertheless, I’m kind of mad at her. 

There’s a curve between Gina’s house and mine, which means that the house being built across the street is directly across from my house, and also directly across from her house. The lot was bought by a retired Austin police sergeant who, during the years between retirement and now, hosted a right-wing radio talk show. He should fit right in around here. I’ve met his wife and she’s very sweet. They’re both in their eighties and frail, and I can’t help but wonder why they’d take on such an intense and draining project. I’ll ask next time I see them. 

Gina and I are both unhappy about the house going up. Here’s what we don’t like: large trucks with their loud smelly motors going in and out of the gate; the way the dust rises and sneaks inside our homes; and the nearby raised voices of people we don’t know. Also, it won’t be long before we’re finding nails in the street. 

It was a lovely lot, too, large, with interesting rock formations, frolicking deer, and more live oaks and cedar than the other lots. That was my view. When the house is finished, I’m going to be looking at the front door, and Gina and her parents are going to be looking at the driveway and garage. 

When construction first started, a homemade sign with the address was posted on the large rock at the corner—102 CEEKSIDE. Gina, who takes things literally, said, “We live on Creekside, but they live on Ceekside.” 

There’s an HOA rule that as soon as the heavy machinery moves in, the builder has a year to be finished and gone. The rock-crushing and digging people were over there for a few days in November, and then no work was done until the first few days of January, after which nothing else happened. We’ve been looking at a dumpster, a porta-potty, and a foundation for more than three weeks. It’s our understanding that a mistake was made with the foundation—wrong elevation in the garage is what I heard—so the workers are going to have to redo a major portion of the work. But currently they’re busy with a project elsewhere. Typical.

This is just stuff that’s going on around here and none of it matters much. Gina’s funny and interesting and I make sure that I give her a relaxed conversation at least once a week; and the people who bought the lot have every right to put a house on it. 

On a sadder note, further up the street, a couple we’re very fond of lost both their cats within three weeks of one another. When the first cat died unexpectedly, the vet thought she might’ve had blood cancer, but who knows? It’s not like they were going to run expensive tests on a dying cat. With the first cat gone, their other cat, sibling to the one who died, was heartbroken and stopped eating. And then she, too, died. Losing a beloved pet is devastating, but losing two, one after the other, is unimaginably tragic. 

Dear friends, I’m sorry for your loss. 

RIP, Coco and Chanel. 

This is the sloppiest construction site I’ve ever seen.

Lovely cats, broken hearts.

Christmas in England

The night after our arrival in London we went to the caroling at Royal Albert Hall, where the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Royal Choral Society, and National Youth Choir performed—with the audience joining in on the carols. Four hundred people singing joyful carols is a glorious and transformative experience and if you ever find yourself in London during the Christmas season, I highly recommend going to this event. Thanks, Julia, for arranging it.

The next morning we took the train down to Plymouth to spend Christmas, plus a few days, with Julia’s family. Getting to know Julia’s parents, Khim and David, in a more personal and relaxed way was helpful in coming to know Julia better. Their essence is one of hospitality. Friends drop in late at night and are fed. They’ve recently renovated their kitchen and their new table is the heart of the household. I would also say that they maintain a calm aspect. A clock is not the law and its hands can be ignored. The work will get done when it gets done. A spill is not a tragedy. This tranquil perspective is something to aspire to, so I shall channel Khim and David next time I feel myself knotting up inside. Thanks you two, for welcoming us and showing us such a wonderful time.

We returned to London on the twenty-eighth. Overall, it’s been a packed trip. Some great restaurants—Indian, Vietnamese, and Malaysian cuisine; oh my gosh, the best fish and chips in the world; The Duck and Waffle on the fortieth floor of some building overlooking the Thames. Sightseeing: As we lived in Bucks County for three years, we’ve seen most of the touristy stuff in London, but we hadn’t seen St. Paul’s Cathedral, so there we went. It was breathtakingly majestic—only in my wanderings I somehow got separated from David, Sam, and Julia; and the battery in my phone was dead.  I spent half an hour sitting in the nave expecting that eventually they’d come through looking for me. Finally, growing impatient, I walked a complete circuit, down through the crypt, outside to see if maybe they were waiting for me out there, then back in through the main entrance; and then I did the circle twice more—until finally I stopped and asked a kind woman in a uniform how I could find them. She called her buddies in the crypt and described my tribe just as the three of them were passing by in front of the downstairs security station. The crypt guys stopped them for me, and I went on down—and it turned out we’d been walking the same circular route at differing points. I’m glad I asked for help because that could’ve gone on for hours. 

Another attraction in London is the shopping. Some don’t like to shop, but that’s not me. I hit the fabric floor of The Liberty Store twice and purchased several yards of their lovely cotton. It was quite expensive so I’ll have to use it wisely. Also, Marks and Spencer’s twice, where I bought two pairs of stylish trousers—one says trousers in the UK, never pants. But I didn’t feel like I’d be paying proper homage to one of my favorite cities if I didn’t go to one of their famous department stores. So we trooped up Oxford Street and joined the masked throng at the entrance to Selfridges. You know how sometimes you think something’s going to be grand, and then it falls flat? Well that’s what happened with Selfridges. From past trips, I remember that there were amazing after-Christmas deals to be had; and though this time they still had their fifty-percent-off racks, asking three hundred-and-fifty pounds for something that was once seven hundred pounds, but looks like it’s worth, at most, a hundred pounds, is offensively audacious. And I wasn’t the only one who was disappointed. Customers were there. People were looking. Nobody was buying.

Before we left the states for this trip, rain was forecast for every day of our stay. And that simply didn’t happen. We got caught in a light rain only once for a few minutes. Honestly, there were times when the rain stopped as soon as we stepped outside and started again when we returned inside. It’s important to recognize when serendipitous things like cooperative weather happen, so I’m taking a second to be thankful for that. 

Yesterday was our day to explore Greenwich. We started out with lunch at a Vietnamese restaurant where we shared spareribs, spring rolls, prawns, a prawn crepe, and a salty egg yolk lobster. Yum. Then we walked through Greenwich Market, a festive grid of booths set up within a square that’s lined with eclectic shops. We wandered from there to the banks of the Thames, passing the famous vessel, Cutty Sark, on our way to the grounds of the old Royal Navy College; and then we walked beyond the navy gardens to Greenwich Park, which is extensive and is the home of the stunning Royal Observatory where, historically, mean solar time was calculated.

“Where’s this pub you promised?” I grumpily asked Sam. By this time we’d walked about four miles and my feet hurt. 

He obligingly led us from the park with its ups and downs, out on to the street where, half a mile later, we arrived at a pub. I ordered a Guinness and got off my feet with a satisfied sigh. It was exactly what you’d expect from a neighborhood pub. Men in corners hovering over their pints and solving problems. The publican with a joke and smile for everyone. And the crazy smelly man who wandered in, speaking loudly, touching all shoulders, and making everyone cringe. Julia and I were the only women, which begs the question—is pubbing a men-only pastime? When I was about halfway through my Guinness, I looked around for the restroom. “I think it’s that way,” David told me, pointing beyond the bar. I got up and headed in that direction—and many men shouted out from their different tables in different corners, “No! It’s over there!” Surprised that they were so mightily invested in my achieving the correct destination, I laughed and thanked them all in a voice every bit as booming as their collective instruction. My philosophy is, if you inadvertently end up being the center of attention you might as well embrace it. 

One final stop along the way—a trip to Sainsbury’s because the flat was out of food and alcohol. Sam demonstrated the store’s new system, which certainly grabbed our attention—he claimed a wand upon entry and scanned the barcodes as the items went into his bags in the basket; and then at checkout the wand communicated with the register so all there was left to do was pay and leave. Cool, right?

By the time we arrived home we’d walked six miles and sixteen thousand steps. Julia conjured up chili for dinner and then we all settled in front of The Witcher. Sadly, only one more episode left of the new season.

Our night of caroling at Royal Albert Hall—you should try to make it next year!

The Bravo Eugenia. What is Jerry Jones’s yacht doing at Canary Wharf?

London is a beautiful city, but some of the architectural choices made along the way have been questionable. This building hulks over the Thames like a massive hideous sea slug.

The Tower Bridge from the London Bridge.

The Royal Observatory perched over Greenwich Park. From there we were off to the pub for a pint.