13—Against All Experts

I sat back on the sofa and watched from behind a book. Curiosity would soon draw the cats out of hiding. Then once they discovered the new carriers with treats, catnip-scented towels, and toys that jingled and bobbled, getting them inside would be a cinch.  

Half an hour later, cd approached, interested but mistrustful. She sniffed briefly at the $91.72 worth of gifts selected for the finest in feline travel comfort, returned to the top of the cat condo, and for the next two days skirted the carriers as if they were traps. MITTS didn’t even bother to sniff but rather dashed past them to the kitchen for a quick bite of food then bolted back into hiding.

Analyzing the problem, I decided that since none of us was much for casual play anyway, we should just skip ahead to Dr. Sam’s reassuring but confident stage. I sat on the floor between the carriers and, to my amazement, was immediately joined by both cats, at which point, my problem turned into a dilemma. This dilemma was the cats themselves. 

While MITTS had initially been named for the extra toes rounding her white paws into kitty catchers mitts, she later became known as MITTStical for the meditative way she sat among the women who came to practice tai chi in our living room. A sensitive soul, she fled at the slightest clatter of a lid against a pot or my voice raised toward the TV at the latest political folly. In short, when all was quiet, MITTS came around.

cd, however, had no use for tai chi or any other transcendent order, the only acceptable form being her own alpha routine. The organizing principle of this routine was a convenient and constant access to food supplemented by lavish reassurance to her demanding but fragile ego. Subjected to even the slightest hint of a plan with any motivation other than her own, cd would draw upon her storehouse of civilly disobedient behaviors. Her specialty was languishing until I became convinced that this time she really was sick. After being declared fit by the vet, she would return home, sprint from her carrier, and leap to the top shelf of the cat condo. MITTS was in all things deferential to cd, her sole perk being that we spelled her name in all caps.

How, I wondered, would the pretty Dr. Sam go about lavishing reassurance in a quietly transcendent manner? The question became irrelevant when my elbow jangled one of the carrier doors, and both cats jetted off in a furry flash. Not a problem, I decided, since none of us was much for that reassuring-yet-confident psychobabble anyhow. So we’d just be ourselves. And when the time was right, we’d go for a little practice drive. 

Several days later as MITTS lay sleeping in the sun, I decided it was time. Well-meaning as my intentions were, snatching such a delicate soul so premeditatively from her nap felt like the karmic equivalent of kidnapping the Dalai Lama for a force-feeding at Burger King. My guilt waned only slightly when warm cat pee flooded my Birkenstock foot bed. The real struggle came next as getting the civil disobedient into travel-ready mode was like working fifteen pounds of Jello into a zip-lock freezer bag.

On the way out to the truck, both cats began a high-pitched lamentation which prompted one curly blonde tot to inquire, “You gotta give your cat to the vet to go to sleep too?” 

Soon, though, we were all in place—MITTS secured in her carrier with blankets on the utility shelf behind the seats, cd hunkered down deep in her plastic prison on the passenger side. I fastened my seatbelt, inserted the key, turned, and shifted the truck into gear. “Everyone okay?” I asked as we pulled away from the curb.

MITTS yowled as if I’d ripped out her claws, and cd flashed me a jade glare through the vents in her carrier. 

We drove around the block several times, then headed north on the freeway. As I shifted into overdrive, both cats began wailing and clawing at the metal doors of their carriers. I pulled off at the next exit. 

“Good job, everyone!” I exclaimed as we pulled into our parking space. “Holy fucking son-of-a-bitch shit,” I muttered to myself as I walked around to the passenger side to extract the cats from their misery.

Inside the apartment, both cats darted from the carriers and refused to come out of hiding for dinner. The next day, I decided that while practice was never going to make perfect, I had at least got my system down for getting the carriers in and out of the truck. 

Next: One Week Before Departure