Since I brought him into my life full-time, Sparta has been the being in my life that my day revolves around and his around me. I can't start the day properly without cleaning up cat vomit. I can't end the day without cuddling with him on the couch. So, I wrote a memoir about him and what pets have meant to me during my life. Here is part 1.
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| Piddy Paws and Sparta...when they still got along |
[The Untitled Sparta Project]
"Shards of glass gleamed in
the yellow light of my lamp. Glitter twinkled among the threads of dark carpet.
Adrenaline pumped through my body waking me fully from my deep sleep as I
stared at the mess and slowly came to the conclusion that nearly everything had
been destroyed. Yellow eyes stared back at me across the mess with fear and
curiosity. I realized I was in way over my head.
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| Sanibel |
Growing up, pets were a central fix on my life. My
mother, who deserved to be the wife of Steve Irwin, the Crocodile Hunter,
played wife, mother of two, and high school biology teacher when she was not
imitating Irwin by wrestling our life-sized crocodile float for the backyard
pool. Real life drove a stake between her and her dreams of rescuing wildlife
and working with Siberian tigers. However, that did not stop her from passing
on a love and respect for animals to me, her oldest daughter. I, too, became
obsessed with every furry creature that passed my way, and together, we rescued
several baby rabbits, raised monarch butterflies, and took in abandoned
kittens. All of our own pets, except the reptiles and small mammals, were
picked up off the street or adopted from the local shelter. It seemed as if we
were always bringing in a new animal because, ironically, we were never able to
keep them alive for whatever reason. Sandy the lizard froze to death, Nibbles
the guinea pig just fell down dead, my first hamster was eaten by the cat,
Nikki the cat had an aggressive streak that bordered psychotic making her
unsafe, and Frisky the cat disappeared one frosty morning and was never seen
again.
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| Turquoise |
When
Sparta entered my life, we had Candy the dog, Piddy Paws the cat, and Turquoise
the turtle. Ma recently put down her long-haired, pink-nosed cat Luca who had
taken the place of her one true love, Sanibel the white-haired cat of princes.
Now, she had found a new replacement under a car at a gas station at two in the
morning. His nose was light like a cougar’s, he had gigantic lemur-like golden
eyes, and a strange brindle pattern over half his face and down his back.
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| Candy |
Sitting on the couch, I was watching TV as usual. My
sister Abbey always went to bed late, which meant that I got the TV in the
morning since she’d sleep until at least noon on the weekends and in the
summer. That morning, Abbey emerged from her room earlier than usual. It took
two glances before I noticed the bright-eyed kitten sitting in her arms.
“Look, Alexa!” she squeaked, cuddling the kitten as Candy
tried furiously to get at what was in her arms. The kitten was completely unfazed
by the short dog and kept his eyes on me. Immediately, I reached for it; furry
animals were like a magnet for me.
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| Nutmeg |
After the usual whining and crying, Ma relented that we
could keep the new kitten much to Piddy Paws’ annoyance and Candy’s excitement.
It took quite some time to come up with a name, but after watching a YouTube
video about a crazy, exuberant cat, we settled on the name of Sparta, or
Spartacus when he had done something wrong.
After adjusting to his new home, we realized that Sparta
was unlike the usual cat. Aside from his strange but beautiful coat of
miniscule stripes on his head, leopard rosettes down his back, and a ringed
tail, Sparta had several characteristics of a friendly dog. YouTube overflows
with videos of cats that attack, spit, and hiss at their poor owners who only
want to reach out and stroke them. Sparta never attacked out of viciousness no
matter what oddball position he found himself in among our arms. At the shake
of a feather toy, Sparta back flipped and leaped into the air with ease and
agility. He even played fetch for small furry mice toys, bounding after them
and prancing back with the toy in his mouth. Occasionally, a strange gleam
would enter his large eyes, and he’d streak down the various hallways with gusto
and craziness.
Then, I never knew how much of a part Sparta would play
in my life. I already had a cat with Piddy Paws. Piddy was a stray I picked out
of a litter at the local animal shelter as a replacement to yet another cat we
could not keep alive to old age. Piddy Paws, a fat regular cat, was my whole
world all through middle school and high school, and when I went to college and
lived in a residence hall for a year, it was Piddy Paws I cried over
incessantly, longing to return to my friend. In my sophomore year, I was
allowed to have a pet in my new apartment. Piddy Paws was the cat I wanted, but
Piddy Paws was also the cat that refused to use the litter box and peed on
random objects. The smell of cat pee is a nose-cringing, breath-holding monstrosity
that cannot be removed. To take Piddy to my new apartment would be a one-way
ticket to eviction, but I had to have a pet with me. I also felt it was unfair
for my mom to solely care for my cat and turtle, so I decided to pull Sparta
out of her home and into mine instead of picking out a new friend from the
animal shelter..."
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| Piddy Paws |
