The Song

Faithful to the law of quarantine, I have gone few places outside the house.  When I do, I go to the grocery store, of course.  And there’s the pet food store, of course of course!

(Interestingly, I have found that face masks and gloves per shopper are greater for those shopping for their pets than for themselves.  Just an observation.)

Food aside, my needs are humble.  I don’t think of myself as a particularly materialistic person.  I don’t equate house-size with success nor stockpiles of toilet paper as a measure of preparedness.  I don’t need a sporty car to convey to others what words cannot.  But my humble ascetism pales next to my cat’s value on the things of this world.  He could care less about the new toy I bring home to him.  And then he does it. 

He cares less. 

Toby understands that I am on a budget, and I appreciate that I am not expected to buy expensive baubles with strings and faux-feathers.  (What are those things, anyhow?)  I go to the pet store for two things: food and kitty-litter.  Okay, three things: food, litter and treats.  But I usually leave with four things.  Four to ten, depending on what I find on the toy aisle. 

On that aisle I find shelf after shelf of balls on strings, feathers on strings, feathers-and-bells on strings.  (Strings figure heavily into cat-play paraphernalia.)  There are blankets that crinkle, remote-control mice, and the laser-dot pens.  OMG!  There are few joys that compare to the satisfaction of watching one’s historically catatonic cat go bonkers chasing an uncatchable red dot. 

So, I get home from shopping, ditch the mask and gloves, think happy birthday to myself while I wash the suds from my hands.  And I dump everything from the paper bag onto the floor in a grand display of toy decadence.  Toby looks at the littered floor, and he looks at me. 

“Check out this tail on a string,” I say excitedly and wave it about. 

It’s like I’m not there.

“I got one of those crinkle tunnels.”  I open a flat box and the spring-loaded tunnel explodes into existence.  And the crinkling sound!

“No?” 

I unbox the laser pen and cast a red dot on the floor in front of the chair he’s sitting on.  Toby’s head jerks, against his will, to follow the movement.  But when he recognizes what has caught his eye, he remembers how the red dot has played him before.  At once, he reels himself in and restores his bored posture.    

“Fine.  Be that way.  Lesson learned, I hope,” I say to myself.  I put the laser pen in my shirt pocket for later when the cat’s not around and I go to the sink to sing. 

It’s true we have been in isolation for a while.  Perhaps he has forgotten what these things mean.  Or perhaps he’s waiting for me to sing the happy birthday song out loud.  Of course!  The sink and the song.  They go together in the time of quarantine.

But before I can get one happy out of my mouth, someone hops onto the floor.  I turn and watch as Toby steps carefully among the brightly colored toys so as not to touch them.  He peers into the open pet store bag, laying on its side, and assumes a get-ready crouch.  Then, for no reason one could point a laser pen at, he darts into the bag and hits the end with a loud ka-POW. 

He hits it again, and again. 

ka-POW!

ka-POW!

He keeps hitting the bag’s bottom, effectively pushing the bag across the floor, plowing a clean swath through the balls and bells and things on strings. 

I pick up the play things and carry them back to my study where the landfield of toys-past would suggest a materialist in me after all.

Back in the kitchen, the bag takes a beating.  The ka-POW’s sound a bit more like ka-RIP. 

On my way back, Toby bursts into the hallway, his head extending out of the bottom of the bag like an MGM lion wanna-be.  His feet have made holes in one side of the bag so that he can move about.  He looks like a bizarre cosplay creature out of a cubist painting.  You know what I’m talking about.

He comes to me with rare humility and meows.  That one word or sound, that creature utterance, is so packed with meaning that it’s not always clear to me what he means.  But this time I know.  I take a seat on the floor, and Toby stands almost-still, thrusting his head forward to bite me as I gently extricate him from the heavy brown paper.  When we are done, he decimates the bag, kneads it with his front paws and lays on it like an attendee at a concert in the field.

And then he proceeds to watch me. And he keeps watching me. Waiting.

Until I get it.

Like a choral director at his sink, I pretend to turn a faucet, and together my audience and I sing the song.

The sound a cat makes leaving a bag.