A Change of Season, A Change of Hours
Winter, if you live deep underground and hadn’t noticed, is rapidly approaching. The splendid colors of autumn are gone, the trees now naked against the gray sky, casting long, thin shadows on the streets and houses below. Oh there are a few stalwarts on my street who have managed to hang onto their yellow leaves, but even their golden canopies are growing thin.
The sun travels daily on an ever lowering and shortening arc, although as I go about my daily errands, I tend to be unaware of its presence. The sun is more often hidden behind a thick gray blanket of clouds and fog adding an extra note of darkness to what I generally consider an already bleak time of year.
Darkness. In the winter it comes early and leaves late, though more often than not on a foggy day, it never entirely leaves at all. Even today, darkness comes earlier than yesterday and departs later. This morning the sun officially rises at 7:13 am and dips below the horizon at 4.44 pm – later than yesterday and earlier than tomorrow. December 21 at 7:04 am, even before it comes up that day, the sun will have reached its lowest arc and then begin its too slow climb higher and higher into the sky – the longest night and the shortest day.
The beginning of winter. Some people see it as a “bright” time of opportunity, as a time of light and warmth! Ice skating, snowmobile riding, skiing, Christmas decorations and lights making the “season bright”. I suppose these are the people who always tend to see the proverbial glass as being half-full. I tend to see it as almost totally empty. It’s dark, it’s cold, it’s going to get colder, and I have to dress up like Eskimo to go outside! As the “Kitty Mafia” would say (if they could talk), “Fogedaboudit!”
Ah yes, the “Kitty Mafia”: Max our menopausal senior kitty, and her evil henchman “Mr. Saito”, named for a courageous member of the Shinsengumi of Kyoto at the end of the Tokugawa Shogunate and later a police officer in Meiji Tokyo. I think sometimes that perhaps “Igor” or “Quasimodo” might have been a more appropriate name. And then there is Sumie, the mafia “gun-moll”, at once hardboiled and yet seductive in getting her own way from my hapless wife. But I digress. Winter to the “Kitty Mafia” is just a minor inconvenience. It means they get to spend more time in the house; but then, there is plenty to do there so “it’s all good”. The fact that they are inside more than out, simply means to them that the proprietors of the “inn” simply must adjust to their presence.
More food, of course, must be on hand and readily available upon demand. In fact, “It’s best if you keep the ‘Meow Mix’ bowl topped off at all times, but don’t let the stuff at the bottom become stale.” Cans of cat food must be stockpiled in a wide variety of flavors and then opened and submitted for approval before serving. Cat’s boxes must be maintained to the utmost standards of cleanliness on a daily basis; in fact, it would be preferred if undesirable material was removed immediately after each use. Saito, as a point of fact, will break into a short operatic aria just after use, to signify his completed task and the beginning of the tasks for the “clean-up crew”.
Winter also means that additional cat toys must be acquired so that those members of the “mafia” who desire to play may have a wide variety of amusements to choose from. Heaters must be turned up with clear access for sitting, meditating, or sleeping at each cat’s whim, and in sufficient numbers so that no one is forced to share with their fellow cats – cat’s do not like to share.
Any forced allotment of anything, be it food, toys, or sleeping space runs counter to cat culture. Sleeping space seems to be a “biggie” at our house, more specifically, futon space. Max must have the bottom of the futon to herself: left side, right side, or between the legs. The lower part of the futon is hers and may not be trespassed upon by her underlings. Saito likes the head of the futon where he can watch the human occupants sleep, knead their faces in his own sleepy ecstasy, or more to the point, watch for any sign that REM sleep has started so that he may awaken the sleeper in order to have their undivided attention. As for Sumie, sleep is always best on top of a warm, breathing human body and the liberal use of claws ensures that she stays in place despite her “bed” tossing and turning.
Ah, to sleep, perchance to dream! There is the rub! Winter and the “Kitty Mafia” mean a change in hours for their human employees (yes, that is really all we are you know, underpaid and overworked). As you may know, when I am not seeking out “evil doers” or battling against crime in our universities during the winter, I work a lot at home. To work at home, more or less keeping your own hours, and thus avoiding the daily trek to the office has become quite popular in the last few years. I think really it started out to be a great thing: being able to drink coffee anytime at your desk, take a snack break, work in your jimmies – great stuff. One could, in theory, sleep late, do their work, and probably have playtime left over each day or at the least a low-stress, casual environment in which to work. Not so with the “Kitty Mafia” in winter. My hours have changed, now dictated by “Max & Company”. 3:30 am has been determined to be the optimal time for me to awake, prepare breakfast, clean kitty toilet facilities, and provide either entertainment for mafia members or to be a temporary playmate – more often than not the target of “play” rather than a “mate”.
The early hours of the morning are also the time when I must open the blinds so that Max can peer out into the night and see all the things that go “bump” in the night and are otherwise invisible to us humans. She has no concept of how much cold comes through an uncovered window. 3:30 AM is also the best time for Sumie to practice for her next action movie role by climbing up on furniture and jumping across the room from great heights. It is also the best time for Saito to practice his interpretations of “Pavarotti’s Greatest Hits.”
In the early morning hours, as I sit and drink my coffee and try to read the news, I am meowed at, poked, prodded, climbed over, and bitten on ankles and feet, “Excuse us, but you really do need to pay attention to us. News and coffee can wait”. Of course there is method to this madness. No more working to the sounds of birds chirping or to the smell of fresh mowed grass carried on a warm summer breeze. The dark, cold silence of early morning is now the prefect time for me to work. (Actually this is true but I’ll never admit it to them). Naptime is permitted in late morning, after a sufficient amount of work has been completed and any outside errands, such as the purchase of more cans of food or litter. Early afternoon, beginning about 1 PM is the time to become active once again, allowing for the preparation of lunch, the completion of chores and work, and the preparation and serving of dinner. Following dinner it’s bedtime. Was it Ben Franklin who said “Early to bed, early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise?” Well, I feel neither healthier nor wiser, and certainly not wealthier. Obviously he did not live with cats! I feel more as if I have been dragged unwillingly over to the “dark side”.
Those persons who see the “half-full glass” are sure to say that the days will quite soon start to grow longer and thus the days warmer. I on the other hand, from the bottom of my now empty glass, see clouds, rain, snow, a lack of any worthwhile sleep, and typing away on some essay or work of Japanese scholarship, in the bitter cold, dark, damp, early hours of the morning: just as I’m doing now. Fogedaboudit!
Copyright 2008 by Hayato Tokugawa
