I lasted about six weeks after my cat died. Although I still miss her (and will always miss her), I needed another cat in my life. In my house, on the windowsill, on my lap. So, before I headed out to the Cherryland Humane Society, I asked a friend who’s a Vet Tech for some tips. I thought she’d tell me stuff about bright eyes and a shiny coat.
Instead, she said one word: Personality. Thus it was that I picked a calico stray. There was something about her intelligent face that spoke to me.
When you step back from pet ownership, you notice it’s kind of a strange idea—the way we bring animals who are very different from ourselves into our houses. The way we want them to be human and admire them for the ways they’re not.
My cat seems to have little interest in being a person and who can blame her? She can leap onto the refrigerator in a single bound, fall asleep in an instant and wake up just as fast. In my next life, in fact, I might prefer to be a cat. Agile, affectionate, independent, inscrutable. My next nine lives.