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The Maine Coon
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Meet our Graduates (Some of the cats we've sold)
Finding a Kitten
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Our Sales Contract
Origins of the Maine Coon
Great Maines of the Past
Of Cats and Queens
The Rainbow Bridge

The Joy of Cats
Panic in the Night
Homecoming
Cats 'n' Consequences
On the Road
My First Show
For Better or Worse
Life in South Texas

As soon as I got home from work, and my joy and comfort pierced me with her “thoughtful” look, I knew I wasn’t going to like whatever was coming next. When she then said, “I’ve had an idea,” then I really knew that this was going to be a conversation I didn’t want to have. For the experienced husband, “I’ve had an idea” are four of the scariest words in the English language. (This statement is in the same category as when my helpmeet looks at me when I’m obviously deeply engrossed in some critical and fulfilling activity, such as watching an NBA playoff game or working the Sunday New York Times crossword, and says brightly, “I know what you can do,” as if I were just staring at the wall, hoping for somebody to suggest a useful and interesting activity, like re-hanging the drapes.)

Anyway, to get to the point of the dreadful idea my bride had conceived while I was innocently at work . . . She suggested that since I was going to Washington, D.C. on business the next day, and since there was this kitten she was owed back by a breeder in Washington, wouldn’t it be wonderful if I picked up the kitten and brought it back with me on the plane? I quickly replied “NO!” which unfortunately did not end the discussion. Although I pointed out with sweet reason that I didn’t particularly want this kitten to join our household anyway, and I certainly didn’t want to have the bother of dealing with a kitten while I was busy being an important business traveler with Bloody Marys to drink, she ruthlessly brought out her trump card - if I brought the kitten with me, then we would save the cost of shipping the little dear. As most wives have discovered, most husbands cannot resist an argument that entails saving a buck, and I am no exception. So while my adored one was continuing to build her case on the basis of how much less traumatic it would be for the “baby” to travel with a person rather than with cargo, my limited brain (not known for its multi-tasking capacity) was still focused on the money we would save if I hauled the darn cat home with me. I think it was somewhere around the third Scotch that I gave in, and said “Yes, it is a wonderful idea.” As husbands everywhere know, this is the inevitable end of such discussions, with or without Scotch to aid the decision process.

In spite of (or more likely because of) my complaints every night by phone during my trip to Washington that collecting and transporting “the d**n kitten” (which is what it had become in my mind) was going to be a tremendous hassle, the fates conspired to make it absolutely painless. The breeder very kindly delivered the kitten to my hotel on the morning on which I was to fly out, with all the paperwork and the kitten support paraphernalia in perfect order (although she did demand that I give her $30 for some mysterious pink certificate, when I thought she should be giving me money for taking the beast off her hands). When I got to the airport, not only did the kitten not cause any problem, but actually seemed to smooth the way through the security check point. (I have to admit that this is a very cute kitten, which would charm even the most suspicious and anti-feline curmudgeon.) Needless to say, just to make my earlier caviling seem petty, the kitten was the perfect traveler. An occasional finger poked into her soft carrier kept her purring for the entire flight, and nobody even realized that I had brought an extra live passenger onto the plane. By the time we’d changed planes once, and spent an eternity in the air together, the kitten and I had become reluctant friends.

The trouble began after we arrived home. I arrived on a Saturday evening (of a cat show weekend) to find my normally serene home in some disarray. For starters, there was the friend from out of town, who had added her numerous show cats to our own herd; the additions had our normally placid Maine Coons somewhat agitated. Fortunately, the new kitten opted to recover from her jet lag by staying under our bed for the evening, so she wasn’t responsible for the destruction of numerous household items and family heirlooms on her first night home.

However, by the second day she was ready to get into the swing of things, and contribute her fair share to the work of turning our home into rubble. We arrived home after the show that lovely Sunday evening and I attended to some business in the garage while the ladies went inside with the show cats. I entered the house to find my joy and comfort, abetted by our out-of-town guest, busily (and guiltily) sweeping up the shards of a rather expensive crystal vase, and shoving bits of flowers under the rug. Shrugging it off with “We never really liked that vase, and the flowers were almost dead anyway,” we proceeded to go out to dinner and try not to think about what might be happening on the home front. It wasn’t until several weeks later that my adored one shared the news that an outrageously expensive lamp had also suffered fatal damage during the same incident; she tries to spare me these annoying details.

The real problem is not that this new kitten is an especially bad kitten; it’s that we already had one kitten in the house, which the adult cats had been doing a pretty good job of keeping squelched, but once we added the second “child,” control was lost entirely. Since the new arrival, both we and the adult (and generally well-behaved) cats have thrown in the towel, and simply sit about, waiting for the next crash. Making it even harder to restore a modicum of discipline, this new kitten has the face of an angel, and has learned to charm her way out of the most egregious disasters. Apparently deriving from some mysterious form of airplane-related bonding, she has picked on me particularly to be her protector, which makes it impossible for me to enforce the discipline which she so richly deserves.

As I recall, in thinking back to that fateful conversation which led to our present circumstance, I said quite distinctly that it was not a good idea . . . it was a very bad idea to bring another kitten into the family when we already had one kitten with whom to contend. That must have been just before the third Scotch, or perhaps before my joy and comfort hit me with the clinching logic about all the money we’d save. For better or worse, now I have no counter against the charge that I’m the one that brought “that d**ned kitten” into the house, and the “just following your orders, dear” defense isn’t cutting any ice. Oh well, most of the wooden and cinder block furniture is still intact, and we only have to survive for the four or five months it’ll take the kitten to grow up. But the next time the light of my life mentions having a good idea... oh, no, I just caught that thoughtful look again. This is not good.

(A note from Joy and Comfort: This curmudgeon is the same man who gives “that d**ned kitten” an ice-cube whenever he goes into the kitchen, because she loves them, and then when I complain that I almost killed myself slipping on the wet floor, tells me to be more careful, and who makes sure there are always plenty of ping-pong balls in his bathtub because she likes to bat them around in the tub. I rest my case.)

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