kiwords

This summer, while Max was away at camp, our fool cat had a nervous breakdown. She's bonded with the family on the whole, sure (except the dog, whose love-eyes and gentle whine causes Melody to scramble up the stairs, her tail seven times its usual size, as though Satan himself just showed up with a catnip toy), but Max is her boy. Her own personal boy, forever and ever without end, amen.

Melody sleeps on Max's bed every night, but when he was gone, this was unsatisfactory. To the extreme. She's not that strong on suffering silently anyhow. Every morning she prowls and meows and shoots everyone in the house pitiful looks, until just about everyone ends up putting more food in her bowl. And then, when you try to dump food in the bowl? She thrusts her head in the stream of food, scattering it everywhere, so great is her anxiety to EAT ALL THE FOOD. Please understand that she's not actually going hungry here. Only once have I ever actually seen the bottom of her food bowl when I fed her. I believe with time, counselling, and prayer, we will all recover from the "I saw the bottom of the bowl" trauma. Please send healing thoughts.

My point is that she's a tad needy. And she needs Max. While he was gone, she spent nights wandering around the house, meowing her sad story to all the sleeping souls. I would like to submit this fact to be filed under "Clay: Possibly a Saint?" : even though he didn't want a cat - ever, for any reason - and even though he is in fact allergic to cats, and even though the DEAL in getting a cat was that she wouldn't sleep on OUR bed, good heavens, not that, Clay agreed with me that Melody should probably sleep with us while Max was gone. And okay, he did hiss at her if she put one paw across the imaginary line separating his side of the bed from The Cat Zone, but still. Possibly a saint.

So soon Melody was curling up with me, which sort of delighted me, if I'm honest. I love having a cat curled up next to me. The problem is that with Melody, there is no "next to." She will sleep ON YOU, thank you very much. I like to sleep on my side, so she would walk up and down my flanks, searching for the right place to alight. It's not like I was depriving her of plenty of cushy spots to choose from, but WHATEVER. CAT. 

Eventually she found her spot and draped herself over me. It was like being gently gripped by a large furry mitten all night long. And while I like to shift positions often during the night, Melody does not approve. At all. And then? Sometimes? She would drag her arch enemy, The Blue Monkey, onto the bed, and engage it in a battle to the death at 3 AM. We were all happy to have Max home, for more reasons even than the usual.

I bring this up because tonight Max is sleeping downstairs, on the couch. He and Raphi are going fishing in the morning with my dad, so they're both sleeping downstairs to make their exit easier (on me. They leave at 5:30, like that's an actual thing people do). And so tonight we have the return of the prowling, yowling kitty of neediness. (She won't go downstairs, because the DOG is down there, and we all know how frightening an animal that takes twelve minutes and four attempts to get to her feet is.)

It's just a good thing she's so pretty. That's all.