It appears that, contrary to our entire cultural education, being beautiful is not enough.
It may get you a Pixar prince.
It may splash you larger-than-life on the billboard.
It may even offer you the opportunity to “influence.”
It will not get you adopted.
In the 2023 Tabby’s Place Yearbook, Eira was unanimously voted Most Breathtaking. She has eyes like David Bowie and a coat the color of starlight.
She birthed daughters in her own image and saw them through to adoption.
She walks three inches off the ground, so fairies and little angels can genuflect underneath. She is Wikipedia’s stock photograph for the entry on “splendor.” She was the inspiration for every song John Legend has ever sung.
She is still holding her breath.
Eira did not ask to be beautiful. The average feline ego is an impregnable fortress. Yet a cat’s confidence has little to do with the lighter sort of loveliness that weighs us down. Eira does not feel like the landed gentry of good looks. In her own bi-color eyes, she is a mere country squire, tending her square of linoleum in the Tabby’s Place Community Room.
She tends to hide, searching in vain for cornstalks to cower between. She will settle for steadfast friends, cats who stay calm in the face of beauty.
She does not want anyone to do manic snow angels in her fur. We yearn to kiss her ermine head. At the sight of Eira, adopters split open like truffles. They are smitten. They fill the sky with a blizzard of applications.
They are disappointed. They go home glum.
Beauty is enough if you are casting a frothy movie. Beauty is not enough if you are casting a novel you have already written, with a placeholder sidekick named “CAT.”
If you have already determined that you are the main character, and the friend of your mind’s eye will roll and loll and liquefy in your lap just so, you do not want a beauty with a heartbeat. You want a finished fresco, a marble statue. You can have what you want, but it will not breathe.
Or you can have a life more breathtaking.
You can have a spirit draped in white velvet. She sees so much beauty in this world, she needs eyes in two different colors just to express her awe. She walks with grace but trips over wonders and miracles every hour.
She will take Fancy Feast from your fingers but reject rumors of her royalty.
She will sit within three feet and agree that it is astonishing to have been born at all, but she will not swirl like a kitten in your lap.
She will love you forever, but she may never let you paint her in your own image.
We don’t know, here in winter’s last stand, if Eira will “bloom” in the scripted way.
You and I may be sitting here in April with a white cat draping herself over us like a feather boa. Or our cheeks may be pink from the light of a cat who remains beautiful beneath her surface.
If our eyes and hearts are open, this much is certain. We will all be a bit more beautiful. If the only outcome that matters is love, it will be enough.
PS: That beautiful, patient person has come. Eira has just entered her Adopted Era. Are you astonished? Me, neither. Beautiful is as beautiful does.