New beginnings

Not that anyone noticed, but it's been a while since my last post. There's stuff going on, I guess, but nothing I've felt like verbalizing. Also, I've been taking some pictures that I think would be fun to post, except I can't find the cord that connects my camera to the computer -- it's in some box like everything else I own, strewn around my new apartment with reckless abandon, while I fill up my limited free time with anything but unpacking.

But I did want to share this: The Dude is the best. He and his family, and I and my family, are all cat people. I have a cat I dote on, of course -- Mr. Kitty. But when I was still in college, my parents and I adoped a mother-and-son deal from the North Shore Animal League -- Mousey and Bugsy, respectively. (Well, my mom named the mother and I named the baby, and my mom claims that she named the mother Mao-Tse -- isn't that clever?? -- but I can't bear to write it that way referentially. It's too silly.) Weren't they cute?

Nine-and-a-half years later, my parents are both battling cancer and other various maladies, I've moved a few states away, and the kitties had settled into a comfortable yet attention-deficient routine. They only really got lovin' when I was back home for a visit. With my mom in the hospital with breathing problems not caused, but exacerbated, by the cats, and my dad with enough on his plate, they decided it would be best to find the cats another home. When I balked, my mom laid it on thick: "Or we could have them put to sleep...they have no quality of life now." Oy, the drama!

Mr. Kitty and Mousey and Bugsy coexited peacelessly for three years when I moved back home for law school. I'd have put up with the fighting and taken them in myself (even though that was a three-level house they hated each other in, and this would be a cramped apartment), but I'm hoping my mom can come stay with me for an extended period once she's out of the hospital, so that wasn't going to work out. Enter The Dude. He loves cats and had been planning to get one anyway. (Although, as he said on our sixth date, "now I'm not so sure...I mean, if I'm dating you, and it works out, and Mr. Kitty doesn't like other cats...." Way to think ahead!) I mentioned the plan to find these guys a new home, and he stepped right up. He said he'd take them.

So last weekend we drove to New York and brought them back. They were scared on the trip, but they hung in there. Now they're slowly getting acclimated to their new daddy and new house. They're getting more attention than they ever have, which Mousey revels in but Bugsy is suspicious of. She's moved right in; he's taking his time to warm up to it, but he is. The Dude is wonderful with them. He gives them a lot of care and attention, and yet manages to not spoil them (like...ahem...I do with animals).

So in conclusion, three cheers for The Dude for rescuing "my" kitties. Now I can see them all the time and I don't have to worry about their having been sent off to live with strangers. My parents are relieved, too, because even though they had bigger fish to fry, my parents still acknowledged that the cats were "part of the family."

(The second photo is from a couple of years ago. Nothing stays skinny in my parents' house for long. I took some photos of them at The Dude's house this week, but again...can't upload them until I find the cord.)