The Unpet People

The woman who used to be my Mother was pacing the floor when we arrived home. She had spent four hours trying to figure out Emma the Wonder Dog and beat a six year old at cards. I had forgotten to give her instructions about Emma the wonder dog when I left. Emma gets bursts of energy. We affectionately refer to her bursts of energy as going physco. We play with her, feed her, or just let her run depending on what she needs.

Mom is not a pet person. She took a different approach. She opened the door and let Emma out. Emma ran out. Emma chewed. Everything she could find. Two hours, a forsythia bush, half a railing, and one piece of siding later the doorbell is ringing. Mom thinks it’s me, although why she thought I would ring my own doorbell is not yet clear. It was Emma the wonder dog. Mom got up four times to answer the door when Emma rang the bell, just to make sure it wasn’t me. She smiled at Emma. She didn’t let her back in the house, but she did smile. I feel for Emma. Mom is not a dog person.

We weren’t allowed to have a dog when we were kids. We got a cat. My Mother would leave a bowl of food out for our cat all day. It had to have food in it. All the time. And a bowl of milk. The cat could be starving and wouldn’t be able to tell us because cats don’t talk. The fact that the cat weighed twenty pounds could have been an indication of the fact that she was getting enough to eat, but the food bowl had to be full. The cat didn’t always weigh twenty pounds. It used to be a kitten. A kitten who needs to go to the bathroom. It hadn’t quite gotten the hang of the litter box thing yet. The manger was on top of the television set. Dad had decided to use beach sand on the floor of the manger for the realism. The kitten found the sand. The kitten liked the sand. The kitten went do-do in the sand. Mom smelled the do-do and went looking for the source. She found it in the manger right next to the three wise men. Her blood curdling scream sends the kitten bolting, and Dad running. Naturally the kitten jumps down and runs right behind the television. Just as naturally Dad chases the kitten. The kitten jumps on the couch and using it as a catapult jumps right into the middle of the Christmas tree which falls over. Right on Dad. My brother and I are laughing hard and trying to rescue Dad from under the tree at the same time.

The kitten didn’t go anywhere after that. Except the couch. And the food bowl. And the milk bowl. And the litter box. The bowls, the couch and to the litter box. That’s it. Before we knew it five years have passed. The kitten grew into a cat. A fat cat. For some reason it decided to venture into the world. She ventured up into the attic behind my brother. He never saw her. No one knew she was missing until later that evening when she was not on the couch at the appointed time. We checked the litterbox. No sign of her. Her food bowl was full. The milk bowl untouched. We searched the house. Every room, every closet. Nothing.
Then we heard this weird noise coming from behind a wall in my parents room. She had fallen through a part of the attic that had no floorboard and was stuck behind a wall. Being the fit and trim animal that she was she decided to nap while awaiting rescue.
My Mother is yelling at my Dad “Fred get the cat out. She’ll starve in there.”

My Dad is laughing so hard his eyes are tearing. Operation obese cat rescue got underway. He lowered my brother down into the space to rescue fat cat who had gone back to sleep. My brother woke her up for her rescue. He thought she should be awake when rescued. Mom got her, carried her downstairs and put her in front of her bowl. “She must be starving.” The cat never ventured again. We never got our dog. Emma the wonder dog never stood a chance.