Two Cats...

.....Spotty on the prowl when it was warmer and he was feeling better....

Many years ago when I was living in Calcutta at my parents' apartment I was running up the stairs when I spotted an abandoned cat and my breath went out. It was a kitten. Curled up and sleeping on the window-sill with the pale light from the sun streaming onto it. It was twitching its nostrils every once in a while and if anyone has seen a kitten sleeping they'll know what I mean when I say that this kitten was really curled up with its head tucked under a paw. It was this spotted little ball. Black and white. More white than black. I brought my fingers close to it. It didn't budge. I stroked it. And it grunted (not purred) a soft grunt. I went up the four steps, rushed inside the house. Went to the fridge, got some milk, warmed it a bit, got some bread and dunked it into the milk - put it all in a bowl and ran out again. The kitten was still there. And at some point he (I don't know whether it was a he - I think it was a he) woke up, blinked and looked a little dazed. It let out a yawn that made its head disappear. I placed the milk bowl in front of his face and put my finger into it, brought it near his mouth, and he licked my finger. He was a bright kitten for he soon lapped up his meal and looked at me with a mighty satisfied expression on his face. I couldn't take him home although I would have if I'd had a place of my own. Later on in the day or maybe the next, he came miawowing piteously over to the door. I petted him and he brushed along my leg. I gave him a bowl of milk and bread and he lapped it up. But that was the last bowl I ever did give him. I never saw him again.

The year before last - there was an abandoned cat. For the better part of the year the cat had been abandoned by a girl whom if I see again I will not waste my time exchanging pleasantries. The cat was black and white. More white than black and for most of the time he wandered around the terrace trimmings (as only cats can) and perched itself near the edge of the terrace, looking up and down and miaowwing. It would try getting into the apartment that had been his home before he was kicked out by the girl who had decided to move houses and leave him behind. For a good couple of months I didn't realise what was going on till Kim, our neighbour, pointed out that the Black-and white tabby had indeed been abandoned. We started keeping some food and water outisde and the white and black tabby was not unhappy with the food but was always more delighted with some attention. It was summer, I think, at that point. So he would lap up some milk too but the thing he loved best was being cuddled. He would settle on your lap and sit and try and sniff your face and roll over and sometimes he would just sit in companionable silence and we (Kim Guha, and I) wondered about and barked at the absent girl who could have abandoned the cat. I named him "Spotty" (I'm not very good with names and the uninspired name fairly stuck to the cat). Sometimes I'd watch him and he'd go prancing across the road (although he never quite really pranced - he seemed to be a rather dignified cat...but I guess dignified cats too have their moments); sometimes he'd very silently approach squirrels, and believe it or not he never did pounce on a squirrel but simply chased them up a tree. And sometimes he was cranky....loving but quite cranky and while he did give Guha a hefty nip one day - I got a hiss and a sharp bite on one occasion...but there was a reason. When one has a growing tumour, which eventually grows to the size of a golf ball by the time it's discovered, I don't think one is feeling particularly good inside and most likely does not want to be petted on its head...

He wasn't well and that came to light in Fall and especially through winter. He was fairly wasting away and was looking scraggly and wasn't always able to groom himself but we didn't know what was wrong with him back then. He would always come and sit on your lap and get petted and comforted and comforting the one who'd be comforting him, and by then there was no hissing nor biting although sometimes I swear he had a rather sad look in his eyes...(there's much I could write about that magnificent cat but only some of it can I write about here). He wouldn't come out of his make-shift house for the food. He would sit there looking at it. Yet if Guha or I went out, he'd leap out of his little house and settle on our laps. There were some days though that I felt like I couldn't go out and sit with him....I don't know how to put this in. It felt like a bloody wrench leaving him and coming back inside. And Spotty would so firmly be sitting there and sometimes he'd fall asleep on your lap...all curled up.

This and that transpired. He was treated by our very kind vet. One of my professor's gave him a home since Guha and I could not take him in (Oh, and I was mad about that but there's no point in being mad about some things....As Guha reasonably pointed out with two little/big cats of our own we couldn't bring in a cat with mood swings...). But just before Christmas Day, I knew. I was visiting Spotty (Spotster) at the vet regularly where he was kept for observation and when all the tests came back negative and my vet told me that I could take him with me...I was there looking and talking with Spotty, and I knew.

He did have a home for a week or so (the exact dates, I have now forgotten). My professor named him "Soccer-Ball" (much more appropriate...although he was all skin and bones mostly...). He slept in the warmth and found some lap to settle on or found someone in the house to cuddle up to. My professor had grown very fond of him too. And yet I knew. And sure enough three days after I went over to meet him one Friday, my professor sent an e-mail. Guha and I went over. We took Spotty over to the vet one last time. And our vet ran some final tests and for most of the time the brave cat sat on my lap somewhat disconsolate but unprotesting looking incredibly fragile - and with the smell of death hanging around him even as I held him close....and when the results came in we didn't flinch when our vet said that it would be better if Spotty were euthanized for he had bone cancer. Our vet did it of course. Told us exactly what would happen and Justin - one of the assistants who was there as well - comforted the little cat as well. I kept patting Spotty on the head and stroking him. Spotty put up a fight though. He didn't go down without letting out one nice loud miaow. I stroked him on the head, called out to God, and by then he was gone.

Guha wrapped him up after some minutes in one of my old grey sweatshirts, which I'd had for a long time...and he was cremated along with that old grey sweatshirt.

And so there went another black and white tabby. There are lots of memories I have of Spotty - but these will do for the nonce. I'm glad though...that I was there when I put him down. That's one thing I am glad about.

Two disconnected bits

The School newspaper, The Exponent, used to carry really bad cartoons but it's one of those things that I always read and groaned over whenever I read the paper. However, today's newspaper carried one by a new cartoonist. (When I read the paper I also read the astrology section and nod my head or shake my head or wonder or worry - not very seriously, but still. I can't help it: I was one of those Linda Goodman fans when we were growing up in school. I had also been a Cheiro fan and read lots of palms through my college days and university days [nobody threw gold coins my way though I did get some delighted "How did you know that?" to my delight as well back then...] and even now I can't help trying to look at people's palms if I can...so if there were a palmistry section - I would have read that as well).

To get back. Today's cartoon tickled my funny bone. The Cartoon Title is: Why We Can't Have Nice Things by Ellie Broughton

One college kid says: Oh, no. My horoscope says today is a bad day for me. I can't take two in a row.

The second kid, with a wry look, says: You've gotta stop procrastinating. That's yesterday's paper.

(*Very often I've looked at the previous day's paper and said the same thing. "Insipid day yesterday and today. Great. But wait. That sounds like what I read yesterday. Ohhhh......"*)

Completely disconnected tale (even my batty head can't come up with however remote a connection):

Two phone calls in a row today: one made to the shuttle service that runs between Chicago and Purdue and one received from the cell phone company for a bill payment.

I talk for five minutes on each call, with the respective woman in charge, and at the end of both calls I thank them and I'm thanked in turn with a very cheery, "Thank you Sir."

!

New Year List

Happy New Year to those who read my blog.

I have been inspired to put up a list of my New Year's resolution. Not having made one in God-knows-how-many-years - it will be very short. I have to thank Pupu for this exercise. So Pupu, when you're reading this, many thanks (I had thought I was too old for this exercise...).

1. I have decided to stop being snooty and send in a paper for the sociological conference for this year, and if the paper gets accepted I'll present a paper within the section of Sociology of Education (including a bit about values, beliefs, and morals). Never done that before and I'm having a good time so far getting my notes in order and refreshing the most important bits before I start looking into what the sociologists have been saying.

2. I have decided not to do anything but laugh about the fact that the venue for the conference this year is in Las Vegas (one of the very, very few places that I'd very loudly said, I will never visit). This does require a point to itself. For if I manage to make it, there will be some poetic justice to it!

3. I am going to get my degree some time this year. Maybe it's the Concorde fallacy. But I've spent too long trying to get a mere degree and making it into a mountain. (That's what I'd done for my undergrad degree too - come to think of it!)

4. I'll also continue to write on the side, send something to the literary competitions this year around and not worry too much about whether it is grand or great enough; try and be sane in my responses towards things that cannot be changed and about things from my imagination, and try and change the bit that I can; brood & obsess less too but not stop thinking or reflecting; keep the sense of humour alive (with some help); laugh some; share some laughs; nurture my sense of empathy; be a little more disciplined and a little more organized and a little less lazy, a little less fearful, and give back something positive to the people and beings around - essentially be a bit "sharing, giving, and loving" - and especially towards those I claim to care for and love.

5. I'll also have fun while teaching in my last semester here at the university while also teaching to the best of my abilities.

6. I'll exercise and walk regularly instead of doing both in erratic starts and fits.

7. I'll save more than I do and get a proper job - however humble.

8. Talk with the few people I do and not complain too much; be a patient and mindful listener and thank God every day that they put up with me.

9. Hope and work towards seeing that the points on my list are being fulfilled bit by bit; dream a bit too and share some dreams!

10. I'll pray in earnestness, and with love.

There's my list at 35. I think I must have made my last list at least 20 years ago.

Happy New Year once again. Good luck, joy and peace.

P.S: Reading and listening to music don't appear on the list for more-or-less obvious (but not identical) reasons. I was reminded some days ago, from my old diary, about a poem that had caught my attention because I'd come across it in a book-chapter: Two Tramps in Mud Time by Robert Frost. Knowing my memory I'd very carefully written down the last four lines of the poem hoping that I'd reflect upon them at a later point. So maybe I'll try reading some more poems as well this year?...