Fred and Me: How my cat helped me survive divorce
(excerpt)My thoughts drifted off until I heard sounds from our neighbor’s backyard. A group of black men in loin clothes and carrying heavy packs were climbing over the back fences toward us. Behind them was a white man dressed in a safari outfit and carrying a large rifle. When they reached us the white man stuck out his hand toward me.
“Dr. Livingstone, I presume.”
I looked over at Fred who shrugged his shoulders.
“I’m afraid there’s some mistake. My name is David Halliday. This is my cat, Fred.”
“Are you sure?” the man asked, looking quite distressed.
“Yes, we adopted him just a few months ago.”
“I mean,” the gentleman said irritably, “are you sure you aren’t the world famous humanitarian, Dr. Livingstone? I’m Stanley from the New York Herald and I’ve been sent out to find this fellow Livingstone. The whole civilized world thinks he’s dead.”
“I’m afraid they’re probably right,” I replied. “In any case, I am not he.”
“You wouldn’t know where I could find him by any chance?”
“Well,” I thought for a moment, “there’s an all night doughnut shop on Dundas Street. If he’s about, you might find him there.” I gave Stanley directions. He thanked me for my help and then marched off with his entourage, climbing over the next fence and into the darkness.
I puffed on my pipe, taking it slowly out of my mouth, and pointed the stem at Fred. He ducked.
“So what the hell is time?” I asked.
“It’s an invention,” Fred replied, twisting the hairs of his moustache.
“An invention?”
“Man is the only creature who experiences time. Trees don’t wear watches. Don’t you find that odd, Dave?”
I shook my head.
“All that is,” Fred continued, “is the here and now.”
I didn’t like what Fred was saying. Time for me had always been an escape from the present into the future. Without time, there was no hope. We were imprisoned in the Now. It was a definition of hell.
Fred wiped his bowl clean with his tail, then licked his tail clean.
“I’ll bet my bottom dollar that Ann was always a bitch.”
“Fred!”
"Dave, face up to it. Your golden memories of Ann is the way you ye chosen to create her. Everyone does it. That’s why people are always lamenting about the good old days. There were no good old days. Everything was always and is now, dreadful. Ann was always the bitch.”
I turned away to relight my pipe. I couldn’t be sure if Fred was serious or if he was just having some fun at the expense of my insomnia. But, was he right? Had Ann always been a bitch? I could remember friends at college warning me about her, how unstable she was, emotionally out of control, promiscuous, manic about her appearance, abrasive and argumentative. She had few friends, except for Flora, a beautiful girl with long blond hair, dazzling blue eyes, a brilliant wide smile and flippers for arms. She was the only person at college, besides myself, who would listen to Ann. And even Flora had warned me about Ann.
“She’s not the person you think she is.” Flora said.
A second image of Ann began to compete with the golden girl I had earlier described to Fred. Ann, turning away from me, not saying anything, making me feel as if I had done something wrong. Always I was wrong. An image of Ann, turning suddenly on me, attacking ferociously as if her life depended on it. And then later crying in my arms, apologizing. “They all hate me,” she would weep. “Everyone hates me except you, David. Don’t ever turn on me. Promise. Why don’t they like me? I try hard, I try so hard to make them like me. I hate them. I hate all of them. David, I’ll be good to you, just don’t turn on me.”
For a long time, Fred and I sat on the fence staring into the western sky, neither of us uttering a word. Suddenly the western sky lit up. I thought it must be a fire of some kind. Then I could see the sun peak its head over the western horizon. I gasped, holding my breath, expecting the sun to rise up in the sky like thunder. But, its rise was quiet, subdued, almost shy. How can the sun be rising in the west? I glanced down at my watch. It was too early for sunrise. At that moment, the sun too realized its error, and looking around to make sure no one had seen it, the sun ducked its head below the horizon once again.
“Did you see that, Fred?” I cried. “The sun began to rise in the west and…”
Fred did not answer. I looked over. Fred was stretched out along the fence, fast asleep.
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