cat's got my tongue

There are three kinds of people in the world: pet people, non-pet people, and pets that think they are people. Molly Ann Schemper is the latter. It's our fault, really, as we picked her up when she was 6 weeks old, and she's only been with us humans since then (besides a quick stint with Buble the bunny of course). Whenever Molly sees a cat on the other side of the window, she starts hissing and growling, and gets so confused. Ironically, were she to get out, she would be dead in a red hot second. She's a big talker, that one...literally, she talks a lot.

You see, when we were living in Liberia one of our neighbors was a little boy named Oscar, and he had the cutest voice ever--he spoke high, and mixed up his plurals and singulars. So when we moved back to the states and got Zach the dog, my brother Josh and I naturally started talking for Zach in Oscar's Liberian English. When Zach died (under the hand of my father, who shall remain nameless), Josh's ball python Snakey Snakerton took on the voice, later newborn Kate, and now Molly. (I think Josh's current dog Juno and their bunny Chuck Norris Nieuwsma all have the voice too--it's really a universal pet language.) So you see, Molly talks a lot. Sometimes she's very sassy, and gets herself into trouble, but it's nice to know what she's thinking at least. Except when she says something like, "I not likes Mommy too much, she kind of louds."

In unrelated news, Greg thinks I've got the cat disease. There is a feline parasite that, when it infects mice, makes them lose their fear of cats so that they come close enough to get eaten. Some say people can get this, thus the "crazy cat lady" syndrome. Which I do not have. Though, when Molly rolls on her back on the carpet, I will throw one hand over my heart, and use the other to push my children out of my way so I can watch her. And once I said,

"I love you!" to which Kate enthusiastically replied, "I love you too!" I awkwardly had to admit that I was in fact, talking to Molly, who was standing right behind her. And when she sleeps curled up in a ball on my bed, with her paw covering her eyes, I have to watch her sleep for a while.

Ok, I may have the disease.

I have a theory that pet people need pets to either fill a certain need for affection or an emotional void, or because they need something else to take care of. I quite readily will admit that Molly is lieu of having a third child (with a fraction of the work!). Growing up we had our fair share of pets. Dogs (Lady, Tippy the one-eyed dog, and Zach), cats (Miss Wiskers, who had kittens in my closet), hamsters, (whose dead bodies Miss Whiskers found in the woods and returned to us), a sheep named Barb after my mom (who I'm quite sure we later ate), a chameleon, and even ponies for a summer. Not even to mention all the Sea Monkeys--oh, the minutes of fun we had! Maybe we weren't doing it right, but one might just as well give your kids a package of yeast, tell them to add warm water, and call it a day.

I do understand that some people can't stand cats, as they are aloof and not affectionate or needy like dogs. I did love Zach very much! My dad decided it would be fun to get my mom a dog for Mother's Day, so we surprised her

with him (boy was she surprised!), and she walked the living room with him the first night as he cried for his other mom, bless his heart. We probably should have known not to pick the one puppy who was trying to escape his box, but he was a good dog for us for many years. We never had to pick up anything we dropped. Once I dropped half an onion and he gulped it up before he knew what hit him. (Molly gets insulted if we give her a different brand of cat food. "Uh...is I on candid cameras? Is this some sorts of sick jokes?") I loved how Zach would cock his head when we asked him a question--he'd even stop breathing so he could hear us. If we said "squirrel" he'd run to the window and bark. If we

said "walk" he'd run to the door and run around in circles. We started spelling W-A-L-K but he even figured that out soon enough. What he didn't figure out was to not fish out embarrassing items from the trash and lay them at the feet of our company. Zach was, what my dad would call, special (inbred). He was allergic to his own food, so for a while we had to make him a special diet of rice and beef, plus his once daily thyroid medication. But man, did that dog get me through my awkward jr high and high school years! Until, of course the summer my dad said he bit him and no longer thought he was safe, so he had to be put down. (I still don't know for sure that my dad didn't stick his hand in Zach's mouth, but he has yet to admit that.)

Elia is begging us for a dog. If it were winter, I'd wake her up at 6am and have her stand outside in the bitter cold for 15 minutes before we leave for school, then make her run home during lunch break, and later pick up some mushy poop in the rain so she could get a taste of the fun times she's missing. Of course, I will admit that the less work that comes with cats does result in less pay-out. If I want to cuddle with Molly, I have to act like I'm walking across the room to get something without making eye contact, then quickly swoop her up. This will buy me a few minutes--more if I scratch behind her ears, though she always acts like she's doing me a favor. ("Okays, but just five more minute, and I's going to grunt just a little bits.")

There is a video going around of a man who'd lost so much weight in the hospital, that his dog did not recognize him until he came close enough to smell him, then he went wild with excitement. I showed Greg this, because it's so precious, then we spent the next 40 minutes trying to find a video where a cat did the same. None exist to date. The closest we came was a man recording himself returning home after being gone for weeks. One of his cats glanced up at him from he couch, and about five minutes in, another cat moseyed up from the basement and ever so slowly rubbed against her owners leg. "What, you was gones?" Cats, am I right? But man, look how cute!