Well, we finally got a new cat. Its name is Madison, and it's a tiny little blue point siamese, only 12 weeks old. It's been crying for its mother every minute since we picked her up Sunday night. It makes my heart ache. The house where we got it was owned by an invalid woman with about twenty pets of all shapes and sizes running in and out of the house. The kitchen counters were layered with an old blanket of newspapers and dirty tupperware (something I cannot stand), and the Christmas tree was half-strung with a pitiful strand of ugly purple lights. Bits and pieces of odds and ends were flung everywhere and left to gather a coat of dust, yet everything still had the scent of selfish attachment. It was a dying house. But all I could think about when we were leaving was how much little Madison loves that house, her birthplace, where she used to play with her brothers and sisters and nurse from her mother. Every night until she dies she'll dream of that home, a place that's so blissfully innocent in her mind that it will be almost a myth, a place where Madison knows she can never go back.

Our last cat, Suki, died last spring. We got Suki in 1988, so I grew up with him. His death should have been a devastating event, but it came and went without so much as a hitch. We'd watched him grow old and weak for over a year, and he became so thin that I began to wish for death; on the other hand, I had a secret desire that he would remain living until I went off to college, far away from the memories of home. When the time finally came, my mother took him to the hospital to put him down. I don't think she could have ever mustered the strength to tell me she was going to do it. I guessed that she did it, though. A week or two later, we received a sympathy card from the vet, and she showed it to me and noted "how nice it was of them." I guess it was her way of telling me. Sometimes I'm annoyed that my parents have a hard time expressing or sharing emotion, because I know they've passed that trait down to me. I don't think I ever cried for Suki. I guess I was so busy with US History and GHP to have enough time to stop and reflect on it. I miss him a lot, though.