Toleration

Cat lovers, forgive me, but I am not a cat person. I can probably trace my general dislike to when I was only five years old. We were at grandma’s house. With unbearble excitement, I ran down the steps to see the four little kittens in the basement. Grandma had placed them in a cardboard box in the den where the cat had her litter. Wide eyed, I stretched out my little fingers and eagerly grasped a cute calico. I pressed the fuzzball to my cheek, brushing its soft fur against my face. A second later, I set the first kitten back in the box, rubbing my watering eyes before choosing another furball. I picked him up to give him a big smooch. The poor kitten flinched by the subsequent sneeze in his face. Mom stepped up behind me, “Honey, you have to put down the kitty.”

“Why, Mom?”

Understanding my dissapointment, she spoke comfortingly, “Put down the kitty and go wash your face.”

 I didn’t understand why I wasn’t allowed to play with the kittens anymore when my brother was happily boy-handling a poor creature by the scruff of its neck. Still, I obeyed and went to the basement bathroom to wash up. When I came back out, I learned that I suffered a terrible disease that would prohibit my playing with cute kittens forever—allergies.

I sulked on the couch, watching my brother grab all the kittens at the same time, practically suffocating them by smothering them against his chest. He didn’t know the meaning of “gentle.” With time, I learned to accept my allergies—through cat hatred. I started to like the jokes about “100 ways to skin a cat” or “Why cats make good doormats.” I made fun of cats in all their “pomp and circumstance” as if they thought they were so special. I laughed whenever my uncle would tease cat people as “dominated by their pets.” At first, I couldn’t even be in a house where there were cats because I would start sneezing incessantly, my eyes would turn red and watery, and my face would itch painfully. Benadryl would help, but I still couldn’t pet a cat or sit where there was cat hair without more sneezing. With time, my allergies grew less severe, and I could be in a room with cats. I just couldn’t hold them. Mom and Dad finally let my little sister get a cat, but Kimba was strictly an outside mouser, and if Ana tried to sneak him into the house, I would soon shoo him out to keep from having to take another antihistamine. In essence, my experience with cats had been negative most of my life.

A year after I left home to go to college, a friend and I talked about becoming roommates and renting an apartment. It would work out great because between the two of us we could cover the rent, she could move out from her parent’s house, and I would be able to move out of the garage/spare room where some friends were graciously letting me stay. One problem—she had a cat. Maribel had owned this cat for more than thirteen years, and she loved this cat dearly. That was the clincher, “Either the cat comes with me, or there’s no deal.”

I took a little time to pray about it. I mean, it wasn’t just the cat or my allergies, but I wanted to make sure I was making the right decision. I felt peace, so I packed up my things, and with one trip in my landlady’s Excavation, I moved into my first apartment with my new roommate and her cat, Susie.

Melodramatic barely begins to describe her. As an older cat, it took Susie some time to adjust to the move. She hid in Maribel’s closet for days. In fact, for the first two weeks, she wouldn’t leave Maribel’s room, and Maribel started to worry because Susie wouldn’t eat. In my sadistic cat hatred, I wondered what Susie might look like if she died of hunger. Susie’s initial adjustment problems soon passed, and she began her exploration of the house and her reign as empress of her new palace. She tested every sunny spot available for the perfect morning nap and curled on every carpeted surface for an afternoon snooze. Growing bored with the permitted areas, she tried napping on the couch or sneaking into my room. However, Susie soon realized that she would not have her way with me. I kicked her out of my room and knocked her off my reclining chair more than once. Her mistress would pet her, feed her, buy her little catnip toys, put up with her meowing in the middle of the night—love her. Me, well, I would tolerate her. I never petted her, knowing I would need to immediately wash my hands and take an Allegra. Susie began ignoring me like a queen tolerating an annoying guest in her court because she has no choice. General disdain became a mutual feeling. We lived together for Maribel’s sake, but we did not like each other.

Frequent vacuuming and keeping my room a “no cat zone” helped me to stay allergy free, so it seemed like living with a cat wasn’t going to be that big of a problem after all. I still teased Maribel about her being Susie’s slave. Maribel, though, loved her cat. She didn’t mind cleaning up the hairballs or “flushing the cat’s toilet” when the cat didn’t properly bury its business in the litter box. I couldn’t understand and figured I just wasn’t a cat person and never would.

I can’t remember if I was on vacation or if it was a weekend, but one sunny day, I was at the house by myself with the cat, enjoying my morning off doing some cleaning in the kitchen. As usual, Susie and I were blissfully ignoring each other. Such was my joy at being home for the day that I started singing a song I learned when I was a kid about the parable of the lost sheep. From the living room, I heard a meow but paid no mind and simply kept on singing, “Eran cien ovejas—” As I sang I heared it again, “Meow, meow, meow.” The meowing grew louder, closer, and even insistent, and I turned to see Susie prancing onto the kitchen linoleum and toward me. I sang the next few words, and she came right up to me, rubbing between my legs. Susie meowed louder and more insistently as she pressed between my pant legs. At first, I was a little startled. Why was this cat behaving so weird? Why was she meowing? Why was she rubbing against my legs as if she liked me? It took a second to realize that she wasn’t angry or hungry, the only sentiments she usually showed around me. Susie was singing.

I laughed out loud at the position I found myself in. I was singing an old hymn in the kitchen, and the cat was joining me on the chorus. As soon as I stopped, the cat would stop, but once I started singing again, the cat would rub between my legs and meow her own little tune. I couldn’t believe it— the cat had won me over. When Maribel got home from work that day, I told her all about Susie’s song. She laughed and said that her Dad and the cat used to sing together, and Susie probably remembered that song. Interestingly, I came to realize that it was in part that song because when I would sing more modern tunes or more snappy songs, Susie would ignore me, but when I would sing the older hymn or chorus style songs, she would start meowing with pleasure and join me even if I was in a completely different part of the house. It became a little game, and when company came over, Maribel would tease and say that Susie had made a cat person out of me. She’d get me to sing a hymn and show our friends how Susie would melt and purr at my feet when I sang.

I can’t say I am a cat lover. I still can’t pet a cat without washing my hands thoroughly, and I don’t think I could ever tolerate having to clean up a litter box on a regular basis. Still, in the two-and-a-half years I lived with Susie, I learned to appreciate this overfed, under-exercised, self-serving feline. Most days, we lived in general toleration of each other. However, on some special occasions, we would step outside of our respective zones of mutual avoidance and come together in a funny chorus of imperfect pitch and meowing arias. Sometimes, we would sing together.