I heard it again today.
“Tabby’s Place seems bigger inside than it looks on the outside.”
I agreed. I always do.
It is one of the most common observations when someone walks into Tabby’s Place for the first time. Their jaw drops, and awe falls out:
“There are cats everywhere!”
“Your sentry is a sausage in formalwear!”
“Tabby’s Place seems bigger inside than it looks on the outside!”
I agree, even though the truth is a half-turn to the left.
Tabby’s Place actually is bigger on the inside than the outside.
I will leave it to architects, physicists, and the kielbasa known as Olive to explore the science of this. All I can tell you is that Tabby’s Place is twelve thousand square feet, containing multitudes of worlds.
Consider the Community Room.
On a tour, I will tell you that the Community Room is our happy hub of meetings. On any given day, you may find people debating anti-diarrheal medication, hand-sewing catnip socks, and/or talking about Bruno.
You will witness passionately comatose sunbathers in window boxes.
You will cross a threshold between worlds.
To the uninitiated, our Executive Assistant’s desk may appear to be an Executive Assistant’s desk. There are the requisite supplies of ballpoint pens, fifty-five gallon drums of treats, and Mickey Mouse figurines.
Oh, yes.
This is not just any Executive Assistant’s desk. This is the desk of Ginny, Tabby’s Place legend since 2004.
And this is just not a desk. This is a palace within our Place.
This is where Tux, age twenty, feels as young as the cowboys crooning on Ginny’s country radio station. The oldest cat at Tabby’s Place feels as shiny as a new buckle in Ginny’s eyes. He is the venerable sun in a shaggy solar system.
If Ginny’s desk were a table, it would keep unfolding leaves to accommodate dinner guests. If Ginny’s desk were a Mustang, the trunk would pop open to reveal thirty tabby clowns.
Ginny’s desk is the nucleus of love in New Jersey, and it is held down by many cats at a time.
These are not just any cats, as though any cats are “just any cats.” These are the wary and the surly, the exasperated and the agitated.
They are the gems who need Ginny’s love.
They are Apricot, so anxious that her own ears appear to be attempting to escape into her head. Apricot was afraid. Apricot was unfamiliar with unconditional love. Apricot seemed to carry the weight of a creature who cannot believe she is lovely.
Apricot now believes fifteen beautiful things before breakfast.
They are Selena, a lonely satellite who bubble-wrapped her heart where no one could reach it. Mournful atop the cat tree, she watched the merry and the much-loved as though through a telescope.
Selena was grieving her person. Selena was disbelieving that love can land twice in a single life.
Selena now nuzzles with intergalactic gratitude.
They are Gulliver, the “gee-shucks” guy whose gentlemanly ways were never guaranteed. It is easy to forget, when you kiss the tailless snuggle-glutton, that Gulliver was once a feral cat.
A careless car disassembled his outdoor life. An Executive Assistant constructed bliss from the raw materials of time + turkey cookies + the love that cannot be earned.
Gulliver is the president of love’s fan club. Also Ginny’s, although there are many co-presidents.
They include Patches, the watercolor painting with the tale of woe. You do not lose your person at age sixteen without wounds, even if you hide them under pastels and sunshine. You do not care as deeply as Patches does without carrying secrets, even if you reassure all cats and all people that they are loved.
Living on Ginny’s desk, Patches knows the pure proximity of love.
Ginny could list all the shy kittens who have “come around” on her watch.
They paste themselves to the perimeter of the Community Room, observing this woman who is much more than an Executive Assistant. They study their neighbors, a federation of bliss.
They unfurl, unguarded, in a room that is an entire world.
They go on to get adopted, and Ginny weeps and whoops at the same time.
The next broken heart arrives. There is always room on Ginny’s desk.
Yes, Tabby’s Place is bigger inside than it is on the outside. This is not an optical illusion. This is the geometry of grace. This is a welcome that widens the walls, and then takes them down entirely.
Olive may be the first one to greet you, but you will find the invitation at every threshold.
Love keeps adding chairs to the table.
Beware, for a heart once opened cannot return to its original size.
All photos courtesy of Ginny, living legend, loved by all.
