Crazy Baby Lady

Tallinn, ESTONIA

Our apartment is finally starting look – and smell – as though there’s a baby living here, but it’s got nothing to do with the living room strewn with burp cloths or a well-fed diaper pail. I’m referring to a litter box and the cats who use it – both suffering from neglect in the extreme.

When we first brought Dylan home (and well into the first minute), I still adored my kitties and was fascinated by their reaction to the baby. You could see them puzzling: “he’s small like us, not quite as cute, but he doesn’t smell like a kitty -lick lick – he doesn’t taste like a kitty, but look at all the attention he’s getting. What, are supposed to feed ourselves now?”

An aroma of cat pee, and a growing community of hair balls flirting shamelessly  with a nearby pile of dirty socks, however, indeed confirm that some of my roommates aren’t getting enough attention. But how many grubby guys am I expected to clean up after? When I finally have a moment to myself, do I want to a) take a shower b) wash my husband’s socks or c) clean cat vomit out of the living room carpet?

With two hairy felines, a baby and a Daddy, my affections and my tolerance for cleaning up after others are stretched and I’m considering how to reduce the number of creatures I need to feed, water and pet. Dylan is a keeper for sure. I can’t find anyone to take Daddy and his dirty socks, so that leaves the kitties.

And the truth is, they were my favorite little guys until Dylan was born when they became dark fuzzy spots in my peripheral vision. Furry shadows casting their needs and my guilt about our home that had, in a day, become too small for all of us.

Poor things, they never stood a chance once I had a child, though this wasn’t something I could have foretold prior to delivering the cutest baby that ever lived. After all this time, these cats never for a moment thought their future was in jeopardy. How could they? Living the privileged life they did with me at their beck and call, they were cared for as no cats have been cared for, catered to and doted upon.   

The Daddy had always had different ideas as to their fate. Much of it was fantasy born of frustration. “Why do they only pee on my side of the bed?” “Who ate my earphones?!!” In his mind, and sometimes on paper, the cats featured in some very elaborate scenarios involving kitty-sized surf boards or purpose-built kitty air balloons sailing over alligator-infested waters into a barbed wire cloud.

Lately, I’d been enjoying similar fantasies, and envisioning the day when a giant seagull might carry them off of our terrace. “Hmm…far more likely if they should happen to have loaves of bread strapped to their backs. Maybe a parsley garnish. . .?”

Yet, if anything is going to inspire Dylan to crawl, it would be the cats. His fascination with these otherly creatures is a thing to behold. When the cats come into view he shrieks at the top of his lungs. Granted, this is not the best way to coax a feline to your bosom, but it’s his way.

I help, by air-lifting one close, and then play referee as Dylan lands a fist on fur, squeezes and yanks for all he’s worth. He slaps at the cat’s face, grabs at his ears, whiskers, eyelids, and the cat, ever the gentle soul that he is, merely waits out the abuse. Like ya do when confronted by baby love.

I think in many ways it’s a very positive thing for a child to grow up with animals; they learn how to treat others with care and love. But at the moment, I am not a very good example, so caught up am I with the little creature I bore, whose demands come without expectation and rewards without measure. All I can give these cats now is food and water. And they know it.

They’re accustomed to more. And I know it.

Fortunately, I think I’ve found them a home, with a couple in New York City who, if it’s possible, are more enamored of them than I. They’re childless at the moment, and having seen their flat, I can say that they are comfortable with a bit of filth.

In America, and maybe in other cultures, we accuse pet owners of requiring non-human creatures to occupy their time, their minds, their hearts. People without children will often refer to their animals as ‘my kids.’

I’d fought the stereotype ever since our cats traveled with us from Chicago to Tallinn. And though I didn’t carry pictures of them around in my wallet, it seemed that I fit the “crazy cat lady” mold, playing mommy to two giant mice. In my affection, I could have been her. What had not been tested was my willingness to share my social security check or, evidently, my heart. 

Now that I’m a real mommy, my kitties are superfluous. Time-consuming. Germ-ridden. Garbage mongering. And, they are creatures most generally accustomed to coming first, which they simply cannot anymore.

What does this mean for the Daddy, you might wonder. Do I intend to cover him in bits of fish and send him out on the terrace as bird food? Is my capacity for love now limited only to ickle bickle baby Boo Bear?

Let’s just say that my tenderness, affection and all the hours in a day are, from now on dedicated to creatures that will reward me with slobbery kisses, wobbly first steps, malodorous diapers or steaming heaps of dirty socks.

I can manage this.  

**Note to cat lovers: these lovely felines flew Scandinavian Air to the US to a wonderful couple who cares for them to this day. As my two children are old enough to clean the cat box, and for the most part themselves, we have a cat, Elvis. I clean his cat box.