I recently adopted a new cat. Or, more precisely, a feral cat found me one fateful April night as I was dancing down my suburban Miami street a little drunk and a little high on shrooms. The first thing I noticed was her long tail, and the fact that she was emaciated. She was friendly enough, and followed me back to my home, which was really a pool house in the backyard of some rich kid. Good times! I was hoping she would be a companion to my 6 year old “little white kitty” Chrundle the Great or Charlie. Turns out, she’s actually Charlie’s (and by extension, my) nemesis. Anyway, here we are three months later and I’m wondering if the cat I picked up is actually the devil. Though I dubbed her “Tokyo,” her Christian name is Mephistopheles. Shit, when I began to write this essay she came and sat directly on the laptop, which I took as a sign I was on the right (wrong) track.
It’s has been a difficult adjustment period because Tokyo is part feral which means she’s four pounds of feline PTSD. Tokes constantly harasses Charlie, and she doesn’t respond well to being pet when she’s: relaxing, chilling, sitting there, sleeping, or hanging out - some sort of trauma from living on the streets, I reckon. I’ve tried to explain to Tokyo that it isn’t nice or cool to harass Charlie, who now sleeps in the bathroom by the toilet and walks through the living room like she might be attacked at any moment, apparently shell-shocked.
The other night (maybe also high on shrooms) I found myself telling Tokyo that she’s going to pass on her own street-cat PTSD in some sort of feline intergenerational trauma and I felt like Obi-Wan using the force “these are not the droids you are looking for” but, you know, without any effect cos I’m pretty sure the cat doesn’t understand English. I started reflecting on the nature of choice and consequence; about how what was at the time an impulsive but good-natured “decision” to “adopt” Tokyo has long-standing consequences, of which I did not fully grasp. But, that’s how all things are, huh? Rarely do we ever fully recognize the extent of our choices, if we can even call them choices. “No one is responsible for anything” Nietzsche might chime in. But if that’s the case, how do we reckon with the effects of what we do? Perhaps it’s just me, an unfortunate product of my impulsive and immature nature - I am closer to being 40 than anything else and yet here I am adopting cats willy-nilly, irrevocably changing the course of her life, my life, and my current cat’s life in one quick swoop. Tokyo was roughly 7 months old when I found her, so she might just be “part feral” and being bit for no damn reason at all might be my new reality.
Sometimes I find myself waking up after a long night of drinking gin relieved that “nobody is ever missing.” But that’s really my repressed frustration at the fact that I cannot control her, or the world, that I do not have magical force powers and even if I did, I doubt they work on archangels expelled from paradise. “But, she can’t be evil!”you proclaim, “she’s just an animal!” Yeah, well, like that song “What if God Was One of Us?” Perhaps the devil is just a grey cat with a perpetual “Kubrick stare” and a long-ass tail. Either way, you can’t deny that the devil would come from Miami.
I have so many essay drafts, both for this silly little Substack and for my “career” as a “professional” “philosopher” (yuck), and after reading a few other Substacks (looks weird plural) by philosophy people I’ve realized I put too much pressure on myself to make things “perfect” (is this a jab?) Plus, just like adopting the devil I’ve otherwise published or posted shit I’ve written impulsively (she engages in it compulsively, and without joy) and nothing bad happened: other people didn’t hate me, and if they did I didn’t care anyway. Trust me, people trashed my last Aeon essay and all it did was make me stronger. Though its a cliche I fully endorse that whole “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger” thing. What matters is that I keep on swinging before I end up swinging, if you know what I mean. So, this post is a promise to myself to start posting more, and it will be something closer to scratching an itch than elucidating a truth, and I hope that this will help me maintain the “hunger” of creativity, and perhaps, just maybe, I’ll enjoy writing again. I wouldn’t hold out much hope for the tape deck though, and by that I mean the whole professional philosophy thing.
Anyway, pray the rosary for Charlie and I as we navigate the consequences of what we do and don’t do, and learn to love a 5 pound cat forged in the bowels of hell.
"I’ve tried to explain to Tokyo that it isn’t nice or cool to harass Charlie, who now sleeps in the bathroom by the toilet and walks through the living room like she might be attacked at any moment, apparently shell-shocked. " .. This is really funny, made me smile!
The first photograph is really beautiful, the colours, the textures — she's looking well. You are right about the long tail!.. I just noticed the little cat shadow behind her, the ears.. maybe a little menacing .. hehe.. and her right paw!.. Is that ready for a swoop! One false move from either you or Charlie ...
"Or, more precisely, a feral cat found me one fateful April night" :) .. She maybe took the dancing as a sign it was a good idea to follow you. A strange dancing creature crossed her path, in the jingle jangle April night she came following you.
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