We had an eight-day productivity setback at B. A. Paul when Stella Marie, one of the trio of feline office staff, came down with a bad case of kitty gastritis. (She’s doing great now, so read on with that peace of mind…)
The ordeal was awful for Stella and likewise horrible for Stella’s humans, especially after one iffy night when I didn’t know if she would make it to her vet appointment the next morning. She went from relatively puny to near lifeless rather quickly.
I and my word count progress went from relatively functional to near lifeless rather quickly. The momentum I’d gained the week before in the writing office was just… yeah. Not gonna continue.
When the kitties don’t feel well, Mother stops functioning.
And unfortunately, when kitties don’t feel well, they stop grooming. (I did keep up my grooming—for the most part…)
When medium-haired kitties like Stella stop grooming, they begin to smell a little funky.
When the other kitties, Amara and Malachi, noticed Stella’s state, the trio fell apart and questions arose:
Why is Stella hiding?
Can I have Stella’s meal if she isn’t gonna eat it? Perhaps her snacks, too?
Is this really Stella? She doesn’t act like Stella.
What smells? This doesn’t smell like Stella.
A little hissing here. A little shunning there. Some growling. This gang has lived together for six years, give or take, but Malachi and Amara began to doubt Stella’s identity.
This escalated to a mutiny level when I brought Stella home after spending a day at the vet clinic for her tests, hydration, and meds.
Her homecoming brought about a gob of hissing here. A ton of shunning there. This is certainly not Stella. Stella is forever gone and this is most certainly the wrong cat.
It took Stella quite a few days before she started grooming herself again. During this time, the suspicion over this “newcomer” gave Malachi and Amara something to fuss about (like they didn’t have enough on their plates with how late Mother is with tuna time and that the temperature in the house has fluctuated ever so slightly).
Their first gripe was that this “wrong cat” shouldn’t eat in Stella’s spot. Hissing and shunning and growling during mealtimes.
The second gripe was that this “wrong cat” shouldn’t sleep on Mother’s lap or in Stella’s spot on the couch. Hissing and growling and shunning during downtimes.
The third gripe was that this “wrong cat” hindered the routine. Hissing and growling and shunning during all the times.
This gripe-fest lasted for several days. Stella has become beyond clingy to me; whether this is from rebounding from her illness or the treatment she received from her counterparts, I’ll never know.
We’re now a week or so out from this ordeal. There has been a ceasefire on the hissing and growling and shunning. The trio is eating together again. Co-existing in the same spaces. Sharing my lap and supervising all my activities as an organized unit.
But did they accept Stella as Stella, or do they believe this “wrong cat” is an entirely new office staff member and what did Mother do with the original Stella?
Amara and Malachi are well aware that Mother occasionally glitches—well, frequently over the last many months, truth be told.
They have witnessed firsthand Mother talking to the glowing screen, asking questions about missing characters and funky plot lines. They hear Mother hiss at the keyboard as she growls and shuns the word count program:
Where did that character go? He must be hiding.
Can I get a little more chocolate in here? Perhaps some caffeine?
Is this what I wrote last night? Surely this isn’t what I wrote.
What smells? This doesn’t smell like something I wrote.
So, you see, Mother questions her own sanity.
It wouldn’t be a stretch to believe Mother glitched and brought home the wrong cat…
