Ten Thousand Balls of Yarn

My parents called me Wednesday night, but I was at the dress rehearsal for "Cabaret," watching a pigtailed Palmy Palmerston twirl her legs in an entertaining fasion. When I got the message — "Just calling to say hi!" — I naturaly assumed something bad had happened, like my bank account taking a turn for the worse.

The next night I finally called my parents back and they told me the cat had died. I immediately thought back to a conversation with my parents I had during my last few days in London. They told me that they had bad news and I assumed then that the cat had finally kicked the bucket. She was fifteen then — and that was a year and a half ago. Instead, my mom and dad informed me that the departed loved one was my grandmother's sister, who had been like a second grandma for me and my brother.

I dno't feel especially sad. I guess having once mistaken my dead relative for a dead cat kind of shut me off to the idea of missing the cat. If I think about the cat, I end up thinking about how much more I miss Gigi. When I go home on Thursday, I might feel sad when I realize the cat won't be there, waiting to greet me with an indifferent stare — a look, I honestly believe, is cat language for "bring me food or fuck off" — but I can't say for sure until then.

This is the only picture I have of her. She was a good cat, I guess, though if you look at the list of her accomplishments over her nearly seventeen years, it doesn't amount to all that much. Then again, the net result is never all that important.