Tuesday, January 8, 2008

Crispy Kitty




What you've heard, read, perpetuated yourself, is false. No one likes their kids equally. Nor their pets. You don't not love the others - but you like one more.

I found Sophia Maria Consuela at Katie's Pet Depot in Westwood. I was all together opposed to acquiring myself a pet from a petstore, but the pets there were only there to be put up for adoption, not sale. I was 20, and no real position to spend a lot of time taking care of another being, so I said if I was going to get anything, it would be an old cat. Everyone wants a kitten, while the old cats get no love. I'd do the right thing, get an old cat, and they wouldn't give a damn if I was out all night getting my party on.

I paid the nominal $30 or so fee for fixing and such, and took her home. Sophie was her name at adoption, and I thought it too confusing for an old cat to change it abruptly. Little did I know the name was chosen days before at the pet store, and Sophie wasn't old, the legarticness could only be attributed to spending her day in a cage with people looking at her. She was one.

So I took home my not really an old cat, gave her three names - Sophia Maria Consuela - easier to yell should I be looking for her under a bed and the like, and we sort of continued on like this. Over the years, we'd pick up another cat, but Sophie would be my favorite. There would be little in the world that would match her perched on the penthouse of her cat condo, peering through the blinds, watching the world happen. When I'd come home and she'd try to escape, "go ahead," I'd say, "it's a rough world out there, if you think you can handle it, who am I to stop you." I am not a crazy person, I know she had no idea what I was saying, but she got I just knew better.

As life got complicated, and disappointments mounted, a search for myself in my 20s turned in to uncertainly closing in at 30, she was there, ready for a good nap. "What do I want to do at 2:00 on a Saturday? Take a nap with Sophie."

At times I gaze at her and she looks troubled, "Kitty tell me your woes."

She doesn't have any woes. She's a spoiled housecat who naps at will and plays with only the finest storebought toys. She does just fine for a cat looking for a home 8 years ago at Katie' Pet Depot. And I've learned love. I loved before her. But I was young and never had I ventured on my own to care for something to that scale. I see her and I just see love. I hold her and I just feel love.

She's my favorite.

In the morning when I get ready, beautify myself so to speak, she jumps up top the sink with little room for her and demands love. Because I adore her ridiculouslike, I give her said love. This morning as I pet her and scratched her and told her how cute I thought she looked, I smelled something just terrible.
Where had it come from?
I gently pushed her off the sink, and as she made the leap, I saw it. All along her tail and legs her entire backend - charred hair; big clumps of black charred hair. In what had probably initially felt good, getting her booty warm, she burned her ass and tail on the open flame of my bathroom candle. I raced around the house, and I know she wasn't hurt, but I was panicked nonetheless. Her tail is a little skimpy on clumps of hair, but a good nap and I'm sure we can both soon put behind us this most unfortunate run in with the candle. The owner trauma may be slightly more long lasting.

Goodnight,
Rebecca and Sophia.

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