I don’t write about my cats much. I’m not sure why. Post photos about them, sure. But I’ve made a habit of keeping their lives private although god knows they don’t care about the Internet and what the general public might think of them.
I think at least some of it has to do with my growing disenchantment with social media, and how it constantly bays for the next Main Character. (I suspect some of that has to do with how we’re come to feel so helpless in the wake of the climate emergency, how we know the world is falling apart and there’s nothing we can do except maybe scream at this one person because it’s some form of control, isn’t it? Some way of making the way of correcting this freefall, this misery of apocalypses we’re facing. If we can make this one thing better, there might be hope for fixing the rest) Or it could just be that I enjoy having one thing kept from the panopticon of the public eye.
Anyway, I’m ruining some of that today by telling you that the Tortie has developed Expectations. No matter the meal, no matter the content of the meal, she inevitably materializes at my shoulder with a bright expectant look. If I do not immediately give her a corner of something (and often I don’t because my food is frequently saturated in alliums), she will then paw at my hand with growing concern, or circle around to try to poke at my plate with a paw. Surprising no one, I have occasionally stood up to eat my meals — and have sometimes regretted this because the Tortie can apparently levitate four feet in the air when she feels like it.
My Tortie is the best girl, though. Who dispenses good night kisses and tells me when she’s leaving the bedroom to pay. She’s ruthlessly disinclined towards sharing food with Big Orange, however, and will go to great lengths to literally snatch meals out of her sister’s mouth but who is perfect in this imperfect world?
I’m in the process of moving (again), which is a somewhat heartbreaking process (Big Orange has been moved eight times in the two years of my life, and it kills me each time because she turns into a trauma floof for at least a week each time), but the new place is, I hope, going to be the last place we go for a while. If we are forced to relocate again, I’m going to train the floofs to be travel cats and we’re going back to wandering the world because clearly, nomadic life isn’t done with me.
Either way, we have set up a very oddly Aesthetic litter box and it brings me great joy.
In book news, Breakable Things has earned out. My weird little debut collection was released in November after an absolute gauntlet of immigration. I’m eternally grateful to my editor Michael Kelly for picking up the book, and to readers for picking up the book (albeit in a drastically different way). If you haven’t picked it up yet, know that there is a lot of people-eating and no small amount of gore, but if you’re reading this newsletter, you probably knew that about me.
(Also please consider pre-ordering The Salt Grows Heavy if you’re inclined towards mermaids and folklore.)
I had more to say but moving has basically eaten my brain so I leave you with a cat photo.
Little Duke Direcats
Went on the prowl
Got up in style
Set up a howl
Looked at a king
(O, what a stare!)
Sauntered on home
To comb out his hair
Hope the move goes well! Congrats on earning out, looking forward to the next book :)