The cats! Tiny landlords of emotional real estate. I miss the uncomplicated warmth of a furry baby—the pure cuteness, the cuddles, the casual emotional extortion, assholery, and the dgaf swagger of a creature that screams for food like you’ve abandoned it in the tundra for centuries. An emotional weather system: unpredictable, localized, and impossible to ignore. Tiny anarchists. Living weighted blankets. Furry grief counselors with zero credentials and absolute confidence. His gaze holds mine, an innocent plea that strips away every pretense, even the messy selfishness.
Look at that little fucker. He’s too cute to make homeless. The boy’s got one brain cell ricocheting around like a Windows screensaver and every ounce of it is dedicated to love, snacks, and standing directly in doorways. That unfiltered need is pure, demanding existence. Not graceful, not noble. A needy, tangible love. A demanding little engine of affection with claws. To be near another living thing while pretending you absolutely do not need anybody. Cats do not solve loneliness. They occupy it with you.
At all hours of the nite. Especially if you just watched a scary movie, when the house settles into that unnatural stillness that makes every coat rack look sentient. The silence between the meows is the loudest part. A temporary vacuum before the inevitable skitter of claws on hardwood; a hollow gallop, like a tiny cryptid doing laps through the hallway at 3 a.m. Every cat believes closed doors are a personal attack.
Then the weight lands on your chest. Purring like a faulty motorcycle engine. Terror defeated by some dusty little roommate named Herbert. A tabby cat curled onto the top of your crown like he pays rent here. The aftermath is cozy and quiet, warm and peaceful. Don’t rock the boat, just enjoy the ride. Cats understand this instinctively. Find the warmest place in the room and commit fully. A truce with the dark, a pact with the world, promising temporary peace. To settle is not to forget, but to learn the geography of quiet; where the calm pools.
Ongoing Mother’s Day project is underway, underwhelming, and will be under appreciated. Herbert supervises from six feet away with the detached expression of a foreman who knows nobody on this construction site has any idea what they’re doing. The blueprint remains, a promise of affection that never quite materializes into something solid. A casual indifference any cat person knows about wholly. Covered in cat hair and vague good intentions.
At the prom party, I was asked to do a doodle of a couple of Disney Adults. Look, this woman straight up showed me how to make pancit, imma make her whatever doodle she wants. That immediately moved her into the same protected emotional category as cats who aggressively headbutt your hand while you’re trying to read.
I can absolutely be bribed with food. This is known information.
It’s been years since I’ve been to Epcot, but I can still smell it. Sunscreen, pavement heat, chlorinated water, overpriced snacks, the electric hum of anticipation. I feel the way my feet dangle and the harness clicks into place on my first ride. When nerves get me anxious to go and every thud of the way up that first climb feels like it’ll be the end of me. My body becomes extremely aware of gravity. Cats understand this too. They spend half their lives startled by invisible ghosts and the other half sleeping directly in sunbeams like enlightenment has already been achieved. I hope I can still ride rollercoasters. How would I know?
It’s a somber moment realizing I may be a terrible friend, or maybe just human in the way humans drift quietly past each other’s grief without noticing. A childhood friend neglected to tell me (or I’ve somehow erased it from memory), but her sweet Peaches has been missing since before Christmas and somehow the news floated out there in the dark for months before finally reaching me. Missing pets occupy a strange space. Not fully gone. Not fully here. Like hearing phantom meows from another room long after the house has gone still.
I mourn for our lost fur babies. I know Peaches and Dumbledore are somewhere out there together, sharing catnip and bad decisions beneath a cosmic porchlight.
There were moments, brief blinding flares, where the noise faded and everything snapped into brilliant, uncomplicated clarity.
Maybe that’s what cats do best. They reduce existence to manageable truths: warmth good. A sunbeam is better. Sit with me awhile.