Originally posted 04.20.2005

My father, rumpled from sleep, swaddled in a plaid wool robe, follows the cats to the basement stairs. Truffle squawks, inching slowly forward and turning his head to check on the progress of the man shuffling after him, and Willow steps daintily, bringing up the rear. Cats are terrible leaders. A dog, having secured your attention, will bound away, then turn and look at you with pity: your two legs are no match for his four, and although he adores you, this limitation either takes you down a notch or merely frustrates him. Besides, you’re clearly patronizing his wish that you follow, and he is not amused. The cat, in contrast, doesn’t lose a second in trusting you, and will stay only inches ahead of your toes. If you’re lucky. More likely, the cat will lead from between your feet, occasionally looking up at you as you try not to step on him. Progress for both of you, especially at an early hour, before coffee, especially for a man who relies on a variety of sleeping aides, not the least of which is a nightcap that would send most people under the table, is painstakingly slow. They’re out of sight, but I can still hear the three as they descend the wooden stairs for the morning treats ritual. The two seal-point Himalayans, with their dark little clown faces and chocolate legs like long velvet gloves, are creatures of daily ritual and demand. The training between biped and feline went both ways with these critters: they endure the daily groomings through something that looks like a circus trick; in turn, my parents know where to be and when, the morning treats, the evening naps. I wonder if this cameraderie is unique to the breed, or if the twins’ behavior is a result of living under ideal cat conditions, that is, as pets belonging to my mom. I’ve never seen anyone quite like her. As though she’d grown up on a farm, which she didn’t, she doesn’t coddle or anthropomorphize anything. Yet she has a softness toward them, a respect for their intelligence and integrity. She believes they have souls, but she never forgets that they’re animals, that even the tamest housecat is a little wild. So she creates an environment where they can be their full creature, and they appear to love her for it. There is a price to pay, however, for loving animals. Despite the best environment, nutrition, attention at home, and veterinary care, her critters never live beyond the typical life expectancy for their kind, and often die younger. The collies didn’t make it past 8, the last one having some sort of cancer. Chaco the horse shattered a leg and had to be put down in her prime; Zephyr the cat died of ailments nobody could figure out at 14, and Maggie was found stiff with death under the porch steps at 15. Of the two remaining, littermates mom picked out to fill the emptiness left when Houdini was hit by a car, the boycat has failing kidneys, a death sentence, and his sister…. Well. She stopped taking all food and water a week or so ago, and mom has to hook her up to take fluids by IV in the morning and force feed her wet food with a syringe twice a day. As we’ll learn by the end of the week, she has a tumor in her chest. Cancer seems to be the theme of the day. My father’s prostate cancer is in an early stage and highly treatable, but cancer nonetheless. Something to scare him, and when he’s scared he leans on her even more heavily than usual. It’s unfair, she cries, in a healthy moment of resentment, “this dear little cat who has never done anything but make me happy, and your father, who is the biggest pain in the ass.” Not that she would wish a different outcome for my father of course. He’ll be fine. But Willow won’t be. She died two weeks after I returned to New York.