Day 71. It's the grooviest thing, it's the perfect dream. (12/3/19)

(Soundtrack: 

Right, a comment on music before I tell you what I'm listening to. It's all subjective this music stuff, isn't it? What one of us finds devastatingly sad another may not be moved by: I personally think that Taste of Cindy by the Jesus and Mary Chain is one of the greatest pop songs ever written. Lots of other people listen to this, hear a squall of feedback and don't notice the beauty within the melody. I will happily trade you the entire works of Beethoven for the guitar part that constitutes the first 30 seconds of Pretty Vacant. Only one of these things moves me in any way.

I'm listening to The Cure. 'All Cats Are Grey' from their Faith album. I bought it in 1981. Loved it immediately. The Cure of the last 20 years means very little to me but that album? That's with me for life. And 'All Cats Are Grey' is one of the most gloriously ethereally sad songs I've ever heard. I loved it 38 years ago, I love it now.)

And the reason I'm listening to this? We went to see a cat today. A rescue cat. Five months old. A beautiful tabby. Light as a feather. Wonderfully defined features. We thought it was time to have a cat again.

We lost our previous cat last summer. Early last summer. He'd clearly been unwell for a short while so I took him to the vets. And the vet, being responsible, let me know that taking him home would be cruel. So we had a horrible, massive decision to make. Which wasn't really a decision because we had no choice in the matter.

He was only 10.

We'd been fairly sure that we'd want another cat. And a cat appeared on Facebook. A post from a rescue centre shared by a friend of J's. These things are signs, you listen to them.

So we made an appointment to 'meet' him. Not see him, meet him. And the rescue centre carried out a check on our address so they knew we were from a decent area. Asked all the right questions about whether we had children, whether we had other pets, and arranged the appointment.

And he was a lovely cat. Handsome cat. Incredibly soft fur. But we had qualms.

Matt wanted an actual kitten. Something naughty. A cat that would bring some mischief into the family. Because he wanted the naughty one when we got our last cat. Back when Matt was seven years old. And we got the quiet one instead. And he was basically never an ounce of trouble.

J wasn't sure. She just wasn't feeling it.

I liked him. I'd have taken him straight away.

But.

He looked just a bit like our Pebble (Matty got to name him when Matty was 7, the cat never got called that. He got called Peggy most of the time. Which must have created an identity crisis of some kind.)

And I felt like maybe we were just replacing our Peggy. And I didn't want to replace him. Because that would be like not missing him anymore. And at the same time it would have been missing him all the time because you'd look at this new cat and think, "yeah, but you're not...."

Tom was sound. Tom was well up for this cat but, sensibly, said "if we're not all sure then it's not right."

Ultimately, he felt like someone else's cat. He didn't feel like ours.

And he'll be fine. He's a beautiful cat, he'll be adopted so quickly.

And we won't have another cat. Not yet.

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