Those of us who delight in the human drama of athletic competition, while it may be a trivial pursuit in the grand scheme of the universe, identify with something outside and greater than ourselves. And we inevitably experience, along with the vicarious thrill of victory – in the famous phrase of sportscaster James Kenneth McManus (a k a Jim McKay) – the agony of defeat.
It may come in the form of a heartbreaking loss or, on the level of professional sports, something worse: seeing your favorite player, the one with whom you sense a bond, the one you most respect for his or her hustle, courage, obvious love of the game and insistence on playing it ‘the right way,’ traded to another team – someone else’s team – in another part of the country.
And when the reason for the transaction boils down – and what doesn’t in our culture? – to money, you first feel outraged, then silly for caring so much about highly paid mercenaries who ‘play’ for the corporate owner of a team that ‘represents’ your region.
But if your favorite player and your niece’s favorite player are traded from your favorite team on the same day – oh, the pain when the bond is severed.
Which brings me to the little gray guy. I knew I’d get around to him eventually.
I’ve never been much of a cat person, but the little gray guy seemed, at least to me, to be much more than a cat.
Timid to the point of disappearing whenever another human was near, he boldly befriended me. He realized early on that I was an easy mark – he could wrap me around his paw and get me to do almost anything he wanted. That didn’t hurt. Nor did my role as a co-dependent – an enabler for his five-can-a-week tuna habit.
His official place of abode was downstairs, but he had total run of the place and spent much of his time – most of it, actually – upstairs with me. And while cynics may disagree, our relationship was based on more than an economy of canned fish and a soft bed and blanket next to a portable electric heater. The little gray guy was my best buddy, and he chose me to be his person.
Questionable decisions aside, he is perhaps the most intelligent critter I’ve ever known, and I watched as his feline-ality – calling it a personality would be the supreme insult – flourished.
Whether demanding that I open a fresh can of Chicken of the Sea, rolling his yellow ball (the green and pink ones were somehow inferior) toward me to play, pretending to be a mighty hunter stalking one of dozens of toy mice he had scattered about the place, or sneaking up only to pounce and scare the living be-jeepers out of me whenever he had the opportunity, the little gray guy became a mountain lion – if you can imagine, as I’m certain he did, a shy, 8 1/2-pound, easily startled house cat transformed into a fearless mountain lion.
And not just an ordinary mountain lion: He was a Nittany Mountain lion, and proud to be one.
He wouldn’t ‘wolf’ down his breakfast, he’d cougar it – along with his Hobbit breakfast, brunch, lunch, afternoon snack, dinner, supper and bedtime repast, with a few tuna-flavored treats thrown in throughout the day. And he still weighed only 8 1/2 pounds!
He was quintessence of curiosity, and acted as inventory control cat-ager – again, manager would be an insult — whenever I opened the refrigerator or a cupboard door. The worst thing I could say to him was ‘doggone it’ or, heaven forbid, if I ever allowed the ‘B’ word to slip out.
By now you’re thinking, ‘Enough with the anthropomorphism’ — puma-pomorphism? ‘He’s a cat, and you spoiled him.’
He’s not spoiled, I often insisted, he’s special. Either way, the little gray guy and I bonded. He got lots of attention and tuna and perhaps a little courage from me, but I got much more from him: companionship, of course, but more importantly, something, someone to care about other than – and outside of – myself.
Recently, due to circumstances far beyond my control, I was forced to vacate, long before I was prepared to, the apartment I occupied for almost nine years. The little gray guy stayed behind. It would have been cruel and selfish to take him away from the only home he has ever known and his brother – his complete opposite, a very ordinary cat, indeed, but his brother, inseparable from the womb, nonetheless.
The little gray guy probably thinks I was taken to the vet and put down: part of life and its inevitable end. He’s almost certainly already charming and mooching off the new occupant and has settled into his daily routine.
Me? Not yet.
I live in a nicer apartment, I’m saving about $5 a week on my grocery bill and, as my Facebook friends might recognize, I have a downstairs neighbor – the source of my daily Esther-ological report – who is a constant fountain of material and amusement.
It’s where I live, but it’s not home.
It’s not like I’ve lost a child. I have good friends who have, and the remarkable grace and courage they have shown through their anguish amazes and inspires me, as it does others who know them and of their family tragedy.
Nor am I going through a divorce, dealing with the death of a parent or mourning the loss of a longtime canine companion, one that helped hold a family together, as another close friend is now.
I don’t mean to wallow in self-pity. My loss is relatively insignificant, and others have faced much, much worse.
I’ve lost my best buddy, the little gray guy.
But it feels like I got traded to another team in another league.
And it is agonizing.
