Ignoble Beginnings
(and Ann Patchett’s This is the Story of a Happy Marriage)
My son Arlo is two and we are always on the go. We travel a lot, we see a lot, we do a lot. All this is possible because we live in a small, one-bedroom apartment. We are rarely home, but then COVID-19 arrives, and there is nowhere to go. Our whole world shrinks to seven hundred and seventy-five square feet.
We begin each day with a walk. In the afternoons, we bake cookies and leave them hanging in bags on our neighbors’ doors. After, we scout locations for impromptu games of hide-and-seek. The City’s parks are closed—wrapped in yellow police tape—but in the frenzy of government shutdowns, two nearby church playgrounds were left unlocked. Each is a miracle of biblical proportions in our tiny pandemic lives.
When one of us begins to melt down—from boredom or the unique pressure of working from home—we go for a drive. Arlo perches on my lap with the windows down and steers the wheel herky-jerky while I ride on the brake. (Child Protective Services never shows up, so I assume they have better things to do. ) After, we take another walk to settle ourselves.
During one of our walks, we meet an old gray tomcat the neighbors call Cole. As we pass by, Cole runs out to the sidewalk to greet us. Arlo climbs out of his stroller and grabs hold of the tip of Cole’s Cat-in-the-Hat striped tail. Does he think the cat’s tail is a leash? Instead of hissing or scratching like any reasonable member of the feline species, Cole leads my toddler son on a walk around the block. By. The. Tail. What magic is this in the most frightening chapter of our lives? I follow behind them, attempting to capture the wonder of it on my phone’s camera. Arlo is enchanted. I am smitten.
For several weeks, we go looking for Cole every day. Ordinarily, he is asleep in the corner of an open-air carport. A neighbor discloses that he belongs to a family containing two large dogs with unfortunate dietary proclivities. (The dogs believe cats are for eating.) Unable to remain safely indoors, Cole is relegated to the carport. He has food and shelter, but neither warmth nor protection.
On a dreary April day, I watch Cole attempt to navigate a deluge of rainwater. He tries to jump up on a large outdoor trash container, but he lands just shy and slides backwards into a soggy swill of mud. It’s pitiful, and my tolerance for needless suffering is at an all-time low. Each news report is an increasingly frightening reminder of looming mortality. Inside this spiral of fear and seclusion, I contemplate the unimaginable.
The next day I call a co-worker who, in a previous lifetime, worked as the director of a major animal rescue organization. I tell her I need advice—Cole loves my son, and I love Cole. She explains that if I walk into the yard or the driveway to take the cat, it will be considered theft of personal property. In Texas, she explains, it is imperative to retrieve an animal from public property—either the sidewalk or the street. This way, it will be considered an animal rescue and not a personal property crime. I get off the phone quickly, my stomach churning.
Several days later, Arlo and I go to a social distancing dinner in a friend’s backyard. Loudly, across the patio, I explain that I’ve found a cat, that I want to bring him home. I describe the situation in broad strokes, confess feeling conflicted about cat-napping. My friend is impatient with ambivalent overthinking. He slams his fist on the table. “For God’s sake! Did the allied forces kidnap the prisoners of war? Of course not! They liberated ‘em! Now go and get your cat.” I heave my sleeping son into his car seat, and wave goodbye. Without making any decisions, I drive to the street where Cole lives.
I park down the way—not wanting any doorbell cameras to capture the license plates associated with a getaway car . . . my license plates, my car. I roll down the windows so I will hear Arlo if he wakes up. My hands are shaking when I cut the engine. It occurs to me that Cole might not even be around—we’ve only ever seen him during the day. But even if he is here, am I actually going to pick him up and carry him off? I sit down on the curb. The air is close, damp. Have I lost my mind? I decide to go home. On the walk back to my car, I remember an essay Ann Patchett wrote.
Nine years earlier, before Covid, before Arlo, Ann Patchett and I used to lunch together. Every afternoon at 12:30, I’d drive to a large shade tree near my office. In my parked car, I read through my entire lunch break. I started with Bel Canto and then read everything else she wrote, often the same day it was released. By the time I got to her 2014 collection of essays, This is the Story of a Happy Marriage, Ann Patchett is more like a friend than a lunch buddy.
The details of her essay “Dog Without End” are hazy on this humid spring night. I don’t remember how Ann Patchett first came upon her dog, Rose. I recall only that the particular dog she did not know, and was not looking for, had already been adopted by another family. Adopted and placed in the arms of their deaf child. Ann Patchett confronted the child’s mother, insisted that their adoption was erroneous, a misunderstanding. The mother took the dog from her crying child and placed her in Ann Patchett’s arms. An ignoble beginning to an epic, sixteen-year love affair.
Recalling all this, I try to conjure up Ann Patchett’s courage, her conviction. I inhale deeply and walk to the middle of the street. “Here kitty, kitty, kitty, kitty,” I call, quietly, under my breath. At first, there is nothing. No movement, no sound. But I do not walk away. I wait. And while I wait, I whisper a spontaneous prayer: it-all-worked-out-for-Ann-Patchett-it-all-worked-out-for-Rose.
“Here kitty, kitty,” I call again. Out of the corner of my eye, I see something move. I look over, and there’s Cole, bouncing towards me. Bounding. Really, you would have thought we had an appointment! He meets me in the middle of the street, where I reach down and scoop him up. He begins to purr and nuzzle my neck. I carry him back to my car. I have no carrier, no blanket, no towel. No matter, Cole is a noble beast. He sits tall on my lap as I start the car and pull away. When we pause at a red light, Cole kneads my arm gently. In this way, he encourages me to keep going.
When we get inside our apartment, my small son wakes up. He is incredulous, “You got our cat??” I put Cole in the bathroom with some water and a plate of tinned tuna. Once Arlo is asleep again, I sit on the bathroom floor with Cole. I tell him that this might have been a very bad idea. I tell him I’m not even sure this is going to work out. I explain that I cannot abide unnecessary messes, that I will not tolerate the destruction of property. I go on and on, talking myself out of this thing I have already done. Cole listens for a while, but even he grows weary of my ambivalent overthinking. He steps onto my crossed legs, curls up in my lap, and falls asleep.
In the morning, I take Cole to the animal clinic where I am not allowed inside. After his exam, the veterinarian comes out to the curb and shouts at me through his mask: “This cat’s in good health, but he’s old, probably 10 or 12, at least. We vaccinated him. Take care.” For the second time in less than twenty-four hours, I drive Cole home. To my home.
There is no discernible transition for any of us. I prepare lunch, and Cole sits upright in his own chair at my kitchen table/work-from-home office. He watches us eat until I offer him a bit of cheese. His gaze is so sure and so dignified that I decide he will be called Edward Tulane. That afternoon, a same-day shipment arrives—cat toys of every shape and variety. I sit on the floor dangling a toy mouse from a string. Edward Tulane watches me. My interest in polyester mice is both fascinating and incomprehensible. Later, after bedtime stories, Edward Tulane falls asleep with his head on my pillow and his arms draped around my son.
Though I previously identified as a dog person, Edward Tulane is the goodwill ambassador of felines. Houseguests are greeted immediately, welcomed warmly. Even dogs are kindly indulged. If Edward Tulane has one flaw, it is a craggy meow that sounds like something from a horror movie. It is so incongruent with his otherwise decorous personality that I laugh each time I hear it, mostly when the food bowl looks like it might be empty in the medium-to-distant future.
Over time, we discover Edward Tulane’s strong preference for popcorn, bacon, and especially white cheddar Cheetos. We also notice that when it is rainy or overcast, he avoids walking too close to the exterior doors. On the few days each winter when it is bitterly cold, he doesn’t leave the bed at all. There is no misunderstanding: “outside” is not a place Edward Tulane has any interest in returning.
You already know the end of this story. There aren’t happy endings for old pets or great loves. Edward Tulane is both. He loses his balance, and the vet confirms he has no idea where his feet are landing. We prop him up with steroid injections for a few weeks, but there is nothing more we can do. On a rough day, I called my sister in tears. It’s only been three years since I brought Edward Tulane home. I can’t imagine life without him. My sister offers to come over after work the next day, volunteers to organize an end-of-life ceremony for him. That night, I sit up late with Edward Tulane, his paws on my soft robe. I text my sister: I’m not ready.
The next morning, Edward Tulane seems slightly recovered. He is still losing weight, but I am optimistic. We give him lots of treats. We let him eat two white cheddar Cheetos at a time. He enjoys the extra attention and seems to be rallying.
On a cool Saturday morning a week later, I wake up too early, both my arms tingling and numb. My now five-year-old son is asleep on my right arm. Edward Tulane is in the same position on my left. In the twilight, he opens his eyes and then closes them again, slowly, purring. My arms ache. I consider shifting slightly, but decide against it. I am nostalgic for this moment, now.
Inside that moment, I doze off again. Several hours pass before we get up and begin our day. I serve Edward Tulane the canned breakfast he prefers, and race out the door. When we return home several hours later, Edward Tulane does not greet us. I find him curled up in his litter box, gone. Edward Tulane is a consummate gentleman. Even in death, he is careful not to leave a mess for me.
I wrap him in a blanket and drive his body to an animal clinic for cremation. The supremely kind receptionist holds open the door and ushers me into an examining room. She tells me to take as long as I need. I rub Edward Tulane’s soft fur, scratch his ears. I tell him I love him. I tell him our lives were better because of him. I thank him for three great years.
When I get home, it is late. I re-read the essay I remembered the night I liberated Edward Tulane. In it, Ann Patchett writes, “Sometimes love does not have the most honorable beginnings, and the endings, the endings will break you in half. It’s everything in between we live for.” Everything. That is what I found in between the pages of her book. Encouragement, inspiration, a story waiting to be called forth in a time of need. A prayer—from author, to reader, to life. “Everything in between” is why I read.
Years later, a friend asks me, “Remember that time you stole a cat?”
I am immediately defensive. “I blame Ann Patchett.”
The truth is that I credit Ann Patchett. Her essay, stored in the archive of my mind, illuminated a dark night in the early days of a grim pandemic. She changed the trajectory of our lives, giving us three years with our cat of all possible cats.
Now, I offer up a second prayer. I hope another author is writing a story about an imperfect pet adoption. And also, that a lonesome employee sits in her car, reading it on her lunch break. And that somewhere, an old cat with a craggy meow and a penchant for white cheddar Cheetos gets a second chance at a great life because of it.