Gone Fishing

You know how your Momma always tells you to let wild things alone. I tried, I really tried. Our cat was barely a day or two old when I pulled her squalling from under the porch. I kept her in a bin around the corner so that her mother could claim her, but she never did. I called Dan, who was out of town on business, who said “absolutely not” but knew we had a new kitten when I came home from school and he was feeding her for me. She was tucked into the crook of his arm wrapped in a towel, clawing and biting at the bottle. As she finished the bottle and keeled over sideways, Dan would say “that’ll do, Pig,” and almost called her “Pig.” Under my protests, though, he switched up to the name “Fish,” for reasons I think only he can remember.

Now this little cat was a menace. She totally took over our new house, terrorizing our older 17-year-old bag-of-bones cat, jumping up on countertops and the tops of the cabinets, into the tub, out of cupboards, through every lovin’ open door she could find. Everyone who visited was exhorted to “mind The Fish” and keep the doors closed. She scrabbled in and out of washing machines, cupboards, boxes, bags, dishwashers, and dryers. She bit everyone who ever loved her, me included. The more a visitor was fascinated with her sleek black coat, elfin eyes and monkey-kitty antics, the more viciously she bit him. She would wait on the stairs and pounce on your feet, or under the bed to jump out and sink claws into bare toes. She walked all over Dan while he was trying to work, sleeping in his in-basket, batting at the birds that rested outside the window – including the doves who finally quit running -- and so scrambling the paperwork that he built a bed for her out of burlap bag and an old towel on top of one of the file cabinets. No shower or bath was complete without her diving into the tub and tracking foot prints all over the wet porcelain. You couldn’t beat her – it only made her more determined. We used a squirt bottle to discipline her when she sharpened her claws on any of the furniture but she turned it into a game and would lay one monkey-kitty paw on the side of the ottoman if she was bored, flex her little claws to check our reaction then run like hell as we sprayed our living room.

When we started collecting baby gear for Connor, she slept in each and every piece, as if testing it out. I think she thought we brought them home for her. She was roundly disgusted with the actual baby and I caught her looking at him one day after we’d put him on the floor in the carrier as if to ask “Dude, what kind of hairless cat are you. ..?” She started peeing on things: sweaters dropped under the coat rack, corners of the room near his daybed, boxes that his diapers came in. Recently, I caught her in his daybed, rubbed her on the head, picked her up and tossed her out onto the old chair she had already shredded. It got worse; she terrorized Ling, danced in and out of the food cupboards, bounced in and out of every appliance. I found her in cabinets, locked in the laundry room, hiding in bags, haunting every door to the outside.

It’s like that kid who insists on riding his motorcycle without a helmet or the race car driver who finally crashes or the stunt junkie who can’t stop or that guy who loved bears and was finally eaten by one. Fish constantly courted death and disaster and they finally accepted her offer. Two evenings ago we loaded the dryer with dark clothes, turned it on and returned to the porch without knowing that Fish was in there. She didn’t survive. Needless to say, it was a bad death and we are totally heart broken. Dan is devastated.

But what do you say when a wild thing is finally claimed by their wildness? Rock and roll is full of such characters: hard drinking, fast living, snarling, chain smoking tricksters who dance with the devil and eventually must pay their due. We love these wildcats and are cut up when their evil ways catch up with them. I know that’s why we loved her and why our devastation at her loss is so inconsolable. I just hope she’s somewhere lapping up Fancy Feast, clambering in and out of cabinets and machines and biting something soft. It’s not that she meant well so much that she gave us all so much joy who got to enjoy the little minx in her wildness. So here’s to little Fish. She’ll be sorely missed.

I just hope my son has a gentler nature.