We had a tabby cat once when I was a boy. My sister was probably six and I was eight, maybe nine. I can’t quite remember. My mind is very bad with dates. Anyway, his name was Felix. Very small for his age, he never quite grew out of being a kitten. He was brown with tan and black stripes. Felix was a sweet and kind friend. The house we were living in was small, and the living room had horrible brown shag carpet. It was the 80’s, and I’m sure the previous owner installed it sometime during the 1970’s. I can’t imagine my parents installing it. It was like our floor was covered in mud, or worse . . . poo.
We weren’t rich, which I’m now very thankful for, oddly enough. My sister and I would actually play. “Makeup People” was a classic. Don’t ask. We didn’t have Nintendo, iPods, or the Internet. There were no TV’s in the car. We actually had to talk, or god forbid look out the window. We did have a television at home. I don’t remember watching it a ton. Maybe Today’s Special or David the Gnome. The good ‘ole days.
If the sun was shining we were corralled out the front door like a herd of confused cattle. Otherwise, we would play in the living room if we weren’t too noisy. We had at least one parent that was on graveyard at any given time. Waking a sleeping parent was like poking a sleeping bear. Not advised.
My sister and I were sitting on the ugly shag carpet that afternoon, in front of the window looking out into the driveway. The house was old. Originally was a one room log cabin from the turn of the century that had been remodeled and updated scores of times. The glass panes we so old you could actually see the molecular change caused by years of earth’s gravity pulling down on the atoms in the glass. The top of the pane was much thinner as a result, and the bottom almost rippled under its thickness.
Felix had one notable feature that keeps him in the forefront of my memory when thinking about a lifetime of pets. Buster-Brown, Blacky, Sand-Paper, Cheetah, Snooper, Zeek, and all the others have a special place in my heart too.
Felix, as sweet as sugar as he was, had the most abhorrent gas you have ever or will ever have the privilege of enjoying. Silent, but deadly. With my sister on the floor with me, Felix would crawl around us, nipping at our fingers. Playing like cats do.
Falling onto my back Felix climbed up onto my chest and I was greeted with a kind little kitty kiss. Rough like all kitty kisses are. A soft sound found its way to my ear, like the sound of air escaping from a Tupperware container. Without time to react we were confronted with a smell that rivaled that of a visit to my favorite Mexican restaurant. Retching with nausea I pushed Felix towards my sister. She wasn’t happy. Despite Felix’s . . . problem, we loved him dearly. No matter how bad it smelled, it would always dissipate.
I love and miss that house with its ugly brown carpet with the burn marks from the fireplace, the big heavy front door, rickety old broom closet. I also miss the windows from an age long ago, and of course that gassy cat. Felix’s grave and our old house are a million miles away, and yet only about a 60 minute drive.
