Whatever we expect from them, cats excel at scrambling our expectations. Perhaps this is one of their great gifts.
Lyrical gangsta and all-around awesome human Albert Schweitzer supposedly said the following: “There are two means of refuge from the miseries of life: music and cats.”
One of the first birthday presents I remember receiving was a Casio keyboard. Although this did not launch me to the levels of Keyboard Cat or Nora, it helped prepare me for Anneke and Mimi.
I walk down the hallway toward my bedroom and a baby-like bleating pipes up. I lean over the baby gate into my craft room and he meows again, more softly. “Hello, Domino!” I call, and he meows again with such little volume it’s no more than his mouth opening and a whisker wiggle.
We live in an age in which it’s easy to be famous. That’s unfortunate, because being famous is hard.
Oh December. Just when we’re ready to write you off as a dastardly doer of dastardly deeds, you give us a thrill of hope, and some out-of-season kittens.
2016 was a doer of some dastardly deeds. The New Year is still nearly formless and void. But a very good spirit is hovering over the waters here. It is the spirit…of birthday cake.
This year is in danger of being remembered for what it took. But woe to us if we forget what 2016 gave.
The measure of a year depends entirely on the scale. For thirteen lucky cats, 2016 was the grandest year of all.