metal heart

I know this offends people all the time, but it’s the truth: I don’t like animals. I just never really cared for them. Puppies and parrots just bore me. The presence or photographs of animals have never quite had the same effect on my countenance or general state of being as they have on other, more normal people. From my observations, I’ve gathered that most people, or females and children in particular, tend to squeal and smile and have marked improvements in mood—generally sweetened expressions appear on their faces—when they encounter the little creatures. I, on the other hand, respond to the ice-breaker question “Which animal would you be if you could be any animal?” in general biology laboratory freshman year by saying, “I don’t like animals, I would rather not be than be an animal.”

Over the years, I’ve learned to adapt these little reactions to seeing animals—at least domestic animals like dogs and cats—to convince people that I’m not as robotic as I actually am. It worked too, for about 21 years. In mid-2008, however, my life was forever changed not by the acquisition of my first cat—a beautiful, now-enormous, fucking crazy, dog-like cat with the sleekest of black coats carefully named Kennedy—but rather, a little angel-kitty with a terrible name who came from the atrocious dale of Carbon area in southern Illinois.

Enter from stage right: Marilyn.

the goddess of gorgeous herself

It’s funny how something that consumes less than one cubic foot of space in the world could make a lover of me. She is such an amazing little feline roommate, it’s near-ineffable. The itty-bitty Marilyn sits in windowsills and blends in with crown molding and antique gold mirror frames to look like a painting. When she blinks her little eyelids over those crystal-clear blue jewels in her face, it’s enough to make a lumberjack melt. I can liken her best to a ragdoll; she is known to go limp in your arms to facilitate obsessive cuddling—she’ll even allow you to hold her like an infant in your arms, sometimes for up to half an hour, if your name is Stephanie Nahas! In the mornings, she hops up onto my bed and nestles into a nook in whatever sleeping position I’m in and lazily spoons with me, all the while purring like a helicopter next to my face. Her delicate demeanor and pretty poses are sufficient to raise a girl recently emotionally tormented by some miserable specimen of the male race out of the depths of despair to immeasurable heights of spirit. Her magic turns tears to smiles upon a simple leap onto a bookshelf or into a shoebox. Her blue-cream points have the ingenuity to inspire collections upon collections of spring fashion lines. Her affections are entirely irreplaceable. I suppose I was wrong, Marilyn’s existence is completely effable. I know four women who are capable of writing about her splendour for sheets and sheets.

The point of my gushing rantings here is that Chan was onto something. Fear not if you are a cold and lifeless shell of a human being as I once was! An investment in a kitten can resurrect you from your desolate solitude, rest perfectly assured.

Though I’ve yet to experience the true potential of the love and affections of a man, I cannot imagine them surpassing the extraordinarily transcendent capacity of this little creature named Marilyn. [Behold my official admittance into the cat lady cult.] My next investment is going to be a housecoat. Cheers.