Introducing, Alfonso Tupelo

Hello. I am, how should I say this? Beautiful, right? Puffy, certainly. Furry. I've been told I'm statuesque. Rubenesque. Romanesque. And when people say these things to me, the words are not, I've been assured, euphemisms for fat.

My name, if you didn't read the title, is Alfonso Tupelo, but usually I go by Alfie, and that's what you can call me, unless you are devoted to formalities, in which case I salute you, dearest lover-of-the-past. I enjoy titles myself. Sir Alfonso, esquire. Duke Tupelo. Mr. Alferson Shmalfie Tupac.

And I enjoy classic fiction. Wuthering Heights is, in my humblest opinion, the best novel ever written. Will you let me be your Heathcliff?

But why am I here, you ask?

I ask myself the selfsame question every morning I wake to a dog sniffing me, snuffling and poking at me, hoping for what? That I burst open, cat-pinata, gore covering the terrazzo and MR huffing and puffing to clean it all up? Bah. Dogs.

People do not say "whoresome dog" or "filthy dog" for no reason. They say these things because dogs are whoresome and filthy and all manner of unpleasant adjectives I won't go into because, frankly? I'm becoming bored of the whole dog-topic. Dogs: intrinsically boring as cat kibble: perfectly delicious.

So why, oh why, oh why am I here?

Let's just say I needed a place to stay. I won't go into specifics. You know how... limiting... specifics can be, don't you?

Although, hm, this is a topic MR complains about. She says she always has to attempt to convince creative writing students that it is in the specific the universal can be seen. She uses as an example hearing about starving kids or needy animals - how that's sad, sure, but we're not, apparently, moved to donate money or however it is we alleviate feelings of guilt until we see said suffering creatures actually suffering. We see their skinny legs and drowning eyes and then rush, run, winter-wind to the cellphone or telephone or fax machine (which is a what now?) and dial into the charitable void.

Specifically then? Because I don't want to rumple MR's feathers. Because it's with those feathers she pours the cat kibble.

I lived on a ship sailing the Atlantic. Their good luck cat, if you've heard of such a thing (or if you haven't). And oh, she was sea worthy, she was - the ship I mean. And we sailed all over this blessed, hellish earth. And I grew fat on rats and mice until one day I pissed off the captain because his delicious tuna sandwich jumped into my mouth and he threw me overboard and I had to swim to shore which is where I found MR, bending over to scoop shells into a net; she saw me and scooped me too and I ate all of the invisible shrimp she hadn't even known were swimming and jumping and turning in the water.

Or I was a gangster and I was a king pin at that; mansions and several million dollars worth of expensive things (like cat kibble, tuna fish, balls of twine, open windows and window openers, lizards). Constantly and with consistency I balled hard. My nemesis, another crime gangster animal named Mr. Porky, tried to take me down because I stole all her kittens' mittens.

I mean, I committed white collar crime. See my beautiful fur? How white and shining my collar is? And also I look too good to be free, is what the cops said to me, just too fine to be walking the streets alone.

Rather a neat parallel (neat as in clean and tidy, not as in cool or nice) to misogyny, I think, although I am not a woman, I am a cat, and I am not a female, I am a male. A better word might be, what? Arrhenphobia? Caligynephobia? Ailurophobia? Why is there no word for fear-of-beautiful-boy-cats?

I worked out a mathematical proof that substantiates my theorem regarding the likelihood of an entire new dimension. Scientists swarmed my house like E.T. They dragged me from my lab, burned all my notebooks; I had to watch my life's work flame into ash.

Or I'm nobility from a distant planet. I hold in my hungry heart the cure for all woe, all suffering; a simple nod from me and all your pain vanishes. The CDC heard about me and came calling. This is my hideout.

I'm sure one of these explanations satisfies you. And I'm certain you know I speak the truth when I say one of these is without a doubt the reason I moved in here. Most certainly.

 Or perhaps it's just I had no other place to go. 

The Trench of Luco's Despair

Hello, dear friend. I apologize for my absence, but you see, and as I informed you a couple weeks ago (how long ago now! How swift time!), the prison guard decided to have major plumbing work done. The other cats and myself were confined to a cramped spare bedroom for something akin to three weeks (I am no careful scientist, no objective observer, plus she did not leave me with any way of keeping track of time, perhaps in just one more cruel bid to disorient and discomfit me). The above picture is the last you will see of this flooring.

It is also the last you will see of that picture on the floor there. Do you spy it? A self portrait by non other than the prison guard. They say she painted it as a child, but I harbor serious doubts on the veracity of that assertion.

Regardless, welcome back, etcetera. Make yourself comfortable while I take you on a journey of despair - plumbing despair.

The first trench. This started just outside the bathroom door. Do you see the little bridge across? Safe. The prison guard and her husband eventually just stayed in a motel from what I have been able to put together. Please note the sand and dust. I had dreams - nightmares - every night. Terror overtook that sand fleas rained a torrent over me. Constantly awaking itchy. Uncomfortable.

Mingus was able to escape one night and he ran along the trench. I could hear the prison guard yelling "Help me! He's going to get outside" or some such nonsense. What did she think - was he going to tunnel his way through the trench?

Perhaps that is what she thought. Perhaps she believes him a mole in her house. Better than the way I am convinced she sees me - a poison, an infection, infestation - someone to be waved away and ignored. Please excuse me a moment. No, I am not weeping.

Here is a final shot of some of the destruction. A pretty significant trench, no? Here you can also see the second bridge - the one the prison guard crossed when she visited us every day to feed us and clean the litter box. Once. A. Day. No more, no less.

I suppose her dedication to the dog is to be excused as he is a simple creature, unable to care for himself - is this what I am supposed to think?

Did she supply us with dust masks? No. Would I have worn them if she had? No, but still, it would have been a nice gesture.

Living for weeks in the closed up room I got to know the other cats better. A shame. I used to be able to tolerate them. There is nothing like enforced, close proximity to one's roommates to make one really appreciate solitude. And I must say any good feelings I had for the dog seem to have pretty much evaporated.

Look at him. The monster. His face so grotesque. His deer legs. Floppy little ears.

Well, he is a sort of adorable, I guess. I am not saying I missed him, but after the company of the cats, it is rather a pleasure to get a break. To speak to someone who would not say, as Mingus did, "I'm like so totally over you, dude. You never shut up."

The dog doesn't say things like that, even if only because he does not know the words and/or he does not understand the phrase.

Life is back to normal. Mostly. Although now there is a river of poured cement running through the house where the trench was. And now I am feeling old, sentimental. Rather free.

How long does contentment last?

How brief a respite this?