That Old Black Magic

When I arrived at my grocery store this morning, I wasn’t expecting to see a giant balloon of a black cat hovering above the fruit and vegetable aisles. But I can understand the need to promote Halloween in this larger-than-feline-life way. What child won’t delight in the smiling cat with the saucer-size eyes? Black cats have gotten a bad rap throughout history, and perhaps a whimsical balloon can help overturn stereotypes.

I have been fascinated with black cats for some time, although not one of our ten cats is pure black. Alvar is the only one who has a touch of that old black magic in his fur. The photographer Brassaï understood the magical mystery of black when he made this mesmerizing portrait of a black cat with fluorescent eyes. The photograph is among my favorites of felines in the collections of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (my employer that puts the Fancy Feast on the table at home).

My brother had a wonderful black cat named Squash who lived to the ripe age of seventeen. To the very end, she liked to stick out her tongue and show who was boss. Here is another of my black furry friends, Oliver, whose caregiver is my good friend and colleague Daphne. Rumor has it that Oliver will be perched on Daphne’s brownstone stoop tomorrow night to greet trick-or-treaters as only a black cat can.

I hope all of us who are Cat Ladies will ensure that our beloved cats of all color, and especially the black ones who are routinely maligned on Halloween, will have a safe night out.

Query of the Day: Is there such a thing as a Cat Lady Halloween costume?

Possession

This morning I dropped by one of my favorite shops for antiques in Houston. I wasn’t looking for anything in particular, but I was in the mood for a change of scenery and an escape from the still-hot weather. The air-conditioned booths beckoned me, and soon a Victorian curiosity caught my eye.

I’m in awe of the number of pet beds that manufacturers make in all shapes and sizes to appeal to the marketplace. It had never occurred to me, though, to buy a relic from the past for one of our ten cats to sleep in. The miniature bed for sale at the antiques shop is made of mahogany and upholstered in forest-green velvet, and the dealer’s neatly handwritten tag made this sales pitch: “The perfect acquisition for your prized possession.”

Consumption makes the world go 'round, yet do we want to go so far as to prize our pets as possessions? Perhaps the dealer was relying on slightly florid prose simply to evoke the Victorian era, and no harm was intended. I could imagine buying the antique pet bed with my even more imaginary disposable income, and I’m sure I would enjoy the purchase for days and years to come. After all, an antique stirs our fond memories of the point of purchase and can prove to be a wise investment, too.

“Acquiring cats” falls into a different league, although we Cat Ladies have no trouble justifying our decisions to bring felines into our lives. Investing in our heartfelt emotions is also a smart strategy.

Query of the Day: Does your cat like velvet upholstery and tufted cushions?

Required Reading

I won’t give away all of the author’s bons mots—there are so many—but here are a few of my favorite lines from Sloane Crosley’s online opinion piece in yesterday’s New York Times, “Cat People Are People, Too”:

“The upside to cat ownership is proximity to a sense of dignity, intelligence and lack of garish behavior. The downside is that a cat is something hidden, a secret that needs confessing as the doorknob turns. By the way, I’ve been to the doctor and it turns out … I have a cat.”

“Don’t talk about your cat,” a friend of mine said when I told him I was writing this, “People will think you’re crazy.”

“As a woman especially, it takes a little self-bolstering to own a cat and be content with publicly adoring it. Did you ever hear the one about the spinster found dead in her pink bathrobe, surrounded by golden retriever puppies? Me neither.”

Oh, do I ever need to have a long conversation with Ms. Crosley! I’ll show her the way.

Query of the Day: Isn’t garish behavior with our cats acceptable in some etiquette books?

Tales of Mr. T.

My friend and colleague Heather relocated recently to Ohio, and little did she know that a stray tuxedo kitten was waiting to greet her and her family. Heather moved into her new house with two cats–a senior diva named Marfa and a naughty young boy named Ocho—and she was not looking to adopt a cat. Getting the new house in order meant setting up a home office, installing new insulation in the attic, enrolling her daughter in school, meeting her husband’s new colleagues, and so forth. Finding a stray cat was not a line item on Heather’s customary to-do lists. But there was the kitten who would soon become Mr. T., and what else could Heather do but to say, “Come inside.”

And that is the way it always works, doesn’t it? Just when we think we have established the perfect feline family, along comes another to test the equation. There is no ready-made formula, or the just-right number, for every cat lover, and leave it to the five-pound Mr. T. to break through the proverbial glass ceiling (well, a window of a house) and announce that he had hit the jackpot when he joined Heather’s family. As fate would have it, Mr. T. and Ocho are best buddies, and Marfa now has the opportunity to watch daily wrestling matches between the two boys. Apparently, Mr. T. is such an accomplished wrestler that Heather’s daughter considered renaming him Sumo.

But Mr. T. he shall be, and I can’t wait to meet the little fellow who forced another Cat Lady to make up her mind quickly. This is my promise: One person rescuing one cat makes a difference.

Query of the Day: Would you watch Mr. T. and Ocho wrestle on pay-per-view TV?

Watchdog and Watch Cat

Well, I did it. Last night I was unfaithful to Lucius. I am in Atlanta, where my brother's dog, Luna, decided that she needed to sleep with me. Luna is a shelter dog who craves affection almost more than Lucius does each day. It took me just a little while to get used to hanging out with a young dog, and a big, frisky one at that. Luna is a Golden Retriever-Irish Setter mix.

I kept lapsing into Lucius-speak, saying "good boy" or "good little man," just as I praise Lucius repeatedly. Luna likes "good girl," accompanied by many pats on the head, and she is a very good girl. I have a strong feeling she will be my watchdog again tonight.

Meanwhile, I am curious to know more about an unofficial "watch cat" I read about. According to the New York Times, a "stray black-and-white cat stands watch" in a crane yard in Port Morris, New York, protecting parts of a massive steel sculpture by Richard Serra that has yet to be formally assembled and installed. This is the only bit of information revealed about the feline sentinel.

Could the cat have been a museum security guard in an earlier incarnation? Or a curator with a taste for industrial art?

A sign in the crane yard says "No Trespassing. No Dumping." What's missing is the sign that says "Cat Welcome."

Query of the Day: Does your cat like heavy metal?