If I don’t shake my spaceship, the confetti will party no more.
I promise I am not having a break with reality.
It could be argued that, having lived under the influence of 4,000 cats over the last sixteen years, “reality” and I had our final tearful goodbye some time ago.
Be that as it may, today I speak to you of something dead serious.
I do not want a dead spaceship. Neither does CAT.
CAT’s spaceship is far more impressive than mine, capable of round trips across SUITE without stopping to refuel, remark on the gravity of gravy, or reconsider the wisdom of feline flight.
CAT has all the wisdom he needs.
This is not, perhaps, the first word onlookers would attach to CAT. When the great Greek poets lauded timeless Wisdom, they did not envision a ring-tailed revolutionary who skids off the cat ramp, slobbers like an inebriated muskrat, and aspires to be the galaxy’s premier incarnation of calypso.
Their loss. CAT is not concerned. CAT has a spaceship to fly.
Recently in the annals of reality, it would have seemed unreasonable to expect CAT to get off the ground. CAT, after all, had been shaken, a veritable jar of Everything Feline Seasoning in the hand of a spastic universe. Being born to a feral mother is enough to leave you flightless, but a diagnosis of THING will pluck off even hot-glued polyester wings.
At least, in the normal order of reality.
But CAT ordered something heartier. CAT ordered a spaceship, powered by a heart of gooey gold.
All the shaking left CAT not grounded, but unbounded. The cosmic chaos convinced him he needed a North Star. And as CAT scoured the skies for Alpha Centauri, Tabby’s Place peered through the microscope of mercy.
Perhaps it’s because we’ve come under the influence of 4,000 cats, but we’re convinced: the small and shaken are the best-qualified captains for love’s ship.
So CAT came aboard.
CAT came to life.
And CAT came to remind us to party with abandon.
CAT had to abandon any hope that the acrid, acid winds of the world would stop. Shaking is a certainty. Tomorrow may bring diabetes or the doldrums or despots who outlaw provolone.
Or it may bring rescue and ravioli, elegant endings and better beginnings than even skydancers dare dream of.
We will shake. We can take it.
Take it from CAT. When your heart is gooey gold, you can live without the stability that is only ever an optical illusion anyway. The horizon is hazy, but you can love the dizzying day and the spinning sky.
Shaking brought CAT to Tabby’s Place. Shaking gave Tabby’s Place hearts for cats like CAT.
You can only tremble for one another if you’ve been shaken, too.
You can also, in the arms of the big mystery, only have life if you keep shaking. To come to complete rest is to rest in peace, and CAT’s pieces and yours and mine still have a lot of party in them.
So does my spaceship.
On a day of personal importance, I was gifted a palm-sized pink starship, filled with gaudy sparkles and a solemn-faced turquoise cat. I loved this object so much, I hung it over my desk, careful to keep it safe.
I did not shake it. It was too delicate, like life.
Then one day, I dropped it, and all the glitter danced.
And all the glitter invited me to the dance.
And I remembered that rest and revolution are best cosmic friends.
And I remembered that total safety is dangerous.
And I remembered that I, too, have a spaceship to fly.
Here in the fellowship of the shabby captains and shining stargazers, Special Needs cats and jumping human beans, there’s always confetti zinging about.
There’s always life, in all its elastic, exasperating, exhilarating vastness.
There’s always cats like CAT, to keep us among the stars.