The cats have been complaining that I have not featured them in a column lately. I don’t know what a big deal being in the newspaper is to a cat, but apparently it is the bee’s knees.
Unfortunately, cats are rarely newsworthy. Cats are generally indifferent to most of what goes on around them. Quite simply, they just don’t care. I have tried explaining this to them, but they don’t seem to understand. I love our cats and I am proud of them, but they really don’t do much other than sleep and use the litter box. Occasionally, they let us know when they are hungry. Cats are hungry a lot.
Cooper has been featured in this column numerous times. I’m pretty certain Cooper believes the column is about him and nothing else. Our other two cats came to live with us when our younger daughter moved back home. Eevee is a sweet tabby girl with a gentle nature and a kind soul. She is the rational yin to Cooper’s rambunctious yang.
Added to this mix is Severus, who looks like a miniature panther, sleek and smooth, but incredibly nervous and anxious. Severus is a good boy and will occasionally show affection, but usually he is a bundle of nerves that appears only to eat once in a while. Cooper sleeps with me, Eevee sleeps in the living room, and Severus sleeps on my wife’s head. This is a fact, and there is photographic proof, but my wife has threatened me with death if I put a picture of her sleeping in the newspaper.
We were just fine as a one-cat household. Cooper enjoyed the luxury of being spoiled. He is strictly an indoor cat and this is his world. Cooper adapted pretty well when the other two came to live with us. Severus and Cooper have formed a dynamic duo, with Cooper leading the young Severus through life here like a mentor. The two boys have bonded and spend a lot of time getting into trouble together. My wife and I don’t have any sons, so this is the closest we’ll get. We’re pleased the boys get along, and enjoy playing, we just wish it wasn’t in the middle of the night.
Eevee is a wise old soul. Where the boys are wild and carefree, Eevee is very patient and deliberate in her ways. Occasionally, we will catch her playing with a ball or a toy, but most of the time she spends sitting and watching, taking note of everything around her. She likes to sit in our kitchen window, and when she does, she yells at the birds and squirrels. She’s like that old woman that every neighborhood seemed to have, yelling at kids to stay off her lawn. She’s affectionate, but you have to earn it.
Cooper has asked me to tell you about the time he saved a bunch of school children from a bear. Cooper did not do this at all, so don’t listen to him when he tries to tell the story. Cooper has never seen a bear. I’m not sure Cooper even knows what a bear looks like. Cooper cannot do any of the card tricks he says he can do and he never dated Heather Locklear. Cooper does like to embellish his stories a wee bit.
I have explained to each of the cats that they have to do something newsworthy to get into the newspaper.
“They just don’t let anyone in the paper.” I said.
“They let you in the paper.” Cooper replied.
“That’s different.”
“How is it different?”
“I write for the paper,” I explained, “The column isn’t always about me.”
Cooper looked at me quizzically. I wondered when he became the official spokescat of the household.
“Your picture is in the paper.” Cooper said.
“That’s so the people who read the paper know what I look like.”
“So it’s about you.”
“I’m not arguing with you, Cooper.”
This was beginning to look like one of those “I Love Lucy”episodes where Lucy was trying to get Ricky to let her be in his show.
“My work here is done.” Cooper said, finally.
“How so?”
“You just put this conversation in the newspaper.”
Cooper was correct. However, it was still my picture next to the column. So there.
[Editor’s note: The cat photos were added to this column without the writer’s knowledge.]
Joe Weaver, a native of Baltimore, is a husband, father, pawnbroker and gun collector. From his home in New Bern, he writes on the lighter side of family life.
