Every day, the second I get home from work- sore and exhausted, I have to pay attention to my two needy cats before I can do anything else.
Norah is a tortie, and extremely boisterous and food motivated (overweight). I watched her once take an entire half a of a deli sandwich off of a plate on a bed, and eat it. Before I even have my boots off she’s in the kitchen yowling. She doesn’t really know what she wants, she just wants you to pick some form of attention and give it to her.
Most of the time she will flop down on her side, which means pet me while I stretch. Other times she wants to be picked up, even though she pretends she doesn’t until she’s nice and situated. I hold her nice and steady, close my eyes if she looks at me, and she turns into a purr factory almost immediately- making bread on the sleeve of my jacket with her fat little paws.
Charlotte, a Grey, waits until after my shower to accost me. She waits for me where I always go to sit down for a minute and relax, my desk here, which puts my face right at asshole level- she will straddle my keyboard the second I sit down, put her anus in my face with her tail up, and twitch her tail around like she’s spraying me.
She’s a burrower so she likes being hugged. I give her light pets, but more than anything she just wants to disappear her face into my hand and stay cozy in the dark protection of my body.
I always feel this rush of being annoyed as soon as they start in with their bullshit, but I can’t not respond to requests for physical engagement from them, and after a couple minutes of petting on them and sniffing their coats, I remember how fortunate I am to share their company and be someone they trust and want to to be close to.
I’ve built them into the house in a couple different ways in my renovations so far. When I redid my living room, I had to build old fashioned window sills after re glazing my 120 year old dreamy-melty glass sash windows, and replace the trim around them. To match the 1890s gilded age aesthetic of the house, I did rosette and plinth block trim on all the doors and windows, and got a bit creative with it. Instead of the usual bullseye, or flower imprint like the original trim still in the house, I got some that were custom.
Mushrooms on the east window where it’s shady and I have a little pond, rabbits on the west window where I often see them bouncing around in the neighbors yard, and on the big window in front facing south, where the girls do most of their neighborhood watching with the stained glass squares making up the top 3rd, I did two cats facing each other on either corner, like the southern oracle in the never ending story. Before I nailed them to the wall, I wrote each cat’s name on the back. Maybe someone will find them someday, and speak their names one more time in this house after we are all long gone.
Additionally, I am currently working on a small powder room upstairs. Tiny square room with a toilet. If you walk in the door and sit on the toilet, you will have walked in and turned around- now facing back the way you came. Next to the toilet is a tiny door that is an attic access. maybe 14 inches across and 25 inches tall. Just big enough to fit. Other than the toilet on the left, and the sink on the right, its the first thing you see when you walk in- directly across from the door.
After trying to come up with a way to hide the hatch cover, while still having it available, I decided to not hide it at all. I’m having an artist friend of mine paint it. My bedroom door is an old solid wood paneled door with a skeleton key. I am going to have that replicated at a smaller scale, complete with functional hinges and even a little knob to open it.
Additionally, I’d like to have a bunch of mice hanging from the door handle- maybe even painted on the wall next to the door, however the artist cares to do it- scared looking mice, trying to open it and get away perhaps. And when you walk in and see that, then turn around and sit down- I want another painting of my cats peeking out from behind the trim of the door- looking across the tiny room at the mice trying to escape through the tiny door. I think that would be a fun little experience to go with the room.
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