Happy, happy autumn, Royal Family!

OK, tell me true: how do you feel about fall? I once assumed everyone is smitten with this maple-syrupy season. I now know that is not the case. I was jolted from my innocence at age sixteen, when my manager at the Gap greeted September with the poetic exclamation, “now everything starts to smell like decay!”

So, not everyone adores autumn.

But you already know who adores everything.

One of the highest duties of being a Queen is maintaining grace and gratitude under all circumstances. This comes naturally to Prescott, who is as pleased by September’s crispy leaves as she was by April’s sunshowers. (Actually, the crispy leaves have a bit of an edge. They whoosh in through the Tabby’s Place door and turn immediately into cat toys/snacks. Queen Prescott the Great and Good appreciates anything that is both fun and the approximate texture of a Funyun.)

If you are glum to see summer go, Prescott is here for you.

Prescott is here, rejecting the concept of boredom. Very well, the sun is getting sluggish in the morning and tucking in too early for bed. But, have you seen the pastel carousel that appeared unannounced in the lobby? This mysterious object, some sort of plush mobile, simply arrived.

It is large enough to accommodate Hips and small enough for Prescott to flatten with her (ever-expanding, never-anything-but-perfect) belly. It may have fallen off a passing spacecraft. It may have been delivered by a skateboarding seraph. Most likely, it was the donation of a Lovely, Lovable, Loving Person, of whom there are many.

Prescott wants you to remember, at all times, the presence of Lovely, Lovable, Loving Persons. Not only are you foremost among them, but you are also surrounded by them.

They are in the grocery store, and on the train. They are at the trampoline park and Arby’s. A statistically significant percentage of them tends to congregate in the Tabby’s Place Lobby. But, really: they are everywhere. They will warm your autumn. They will “summer” your winter.

Trust your Queen.

Trust your Queen, for she trusts everyone.

I am perennially baffled by this. I sit at Prescott’s knees and ask her to teach me. Time and again, she forgives as quickly as she is offended.

If you have just expressed her bladder — something she biologically requires three times a day, but finds offensive one hundred percent of the time — she will head-bonk you and purr vigorously into your shins the second you finish.

If you are “too busy” to pet her, bustling through the lobby without awarding her a single kiss, she will still greet you as an international celebrity the next time you appear.

Even if you prevent her from galloping into Quinn’s Corner, she will widen her eyes to the size of kiwis and mew sonnets at you through the glass. I can neither confirm nor deny that this performance has nearly convinced me to smuggle her into Quinn’s Corner and harbor her as a regal fugitive in my own office.

Err on the side of trust and tenderness. Trust the oak trees that shed their leaves like confetti, and the pine trees that don’t. Trust the creativity of our species to tack the adjective “pumpkin spice” onto everything from trash bags to macaroni and cheese. (I did not say “prudence.”)

Trust the wisdom of seasons themselves, because life will always present itself as delicious to the happy-go-lucky. Listen to your Queen.

Listen to Prescott, even when her own powers of listening are stretched to the limit. Given the fact that Prescott is perfect, she had elegant and excellent reasons for what I am about to disclose.

But … at the end of summer, Prescott met the first individual with whom she had no patience.

I am speaking of Stewart.

To the untrained eye, Stewart seems irresistible. He is a toddler of towering joy. He will purr in your arms with the bliss of eight billion sunbeams. He frolics, giggles, and has a doctorate in the verb “to bimble.”

Stewart also has a neurological condition causing him to wobble, as though his own happiness causes seismic activity.

We initially thought this was cerebellar hypoplasia (CH), a non-progressive, harmless congenital issue. We then feared it might be something more life-threatening. You will be pleased to hear that a world-class neurologist confirmed it is none of the above: it is just a harmless quirk, and Stewart can expect a long, merry life.

Mostly merry, anyway.

There is just one Stewartly dream that shall not come true … Stewart will never get to marry Prescott.

Dear sponsors, I have seldom seen anyone make so valiant an effort when it comes to unrequited love. The Lobby’s littlest gentleman approached Prescott with awe. He sought her affection with softness. He recognized that he was in the presence of splendor, and he behaved accordingly.

Queen Prescott the Great and Good could not even look at the poor guy.

But perhaps that is our final “embrace autumn” lesson.

Prescott did not pummel Stewart. She did not dispatch Hips as her henchman. She did not even hiss in her wee admirer’s face, not even when he turned himself into a singing telegram and crooned “Jersey Girl” badly. (Prescott did have to concede that, in the venerable words of Bruce Springsteen, nothing matters in the whole wide world when you’re in love with a Jersey girl. Also, sha la la.)

She simply ignored him. (See video below.) She gave him space. She trusted the summer wind to give him grace.

Then, he was adopted.

And now, it is the edge of autumn.

One healthy, happy, wise, warmhearted Queen Prescott is thriving because of you, beloved sponsors.

May September exceed your expectations, and may you know how much you are loved.

With gratitude and affection, your correspondent,
Angela