Muesli And Meows
I was stuck for six hours in traffic on my way to see you. I’m so sorry. I wish I could control traffic. Wave my hand from behind the steering wheel and gently push the sea of cars in front of me to the side. Like Moses. But I suppose one has to believe in a white male hetero God and have an epic beard to part seas or cars. I neither believe nor can I grow facial hair, so that’s out the window. I mean, I can sort of grow facial hair. I call it “dollar store disney villain” facial hair because if I let it grow it inevitably morphs into a scraggly, patchy goatee that mostly just makes me look unkempt. Anyway, I called the supervisor twice on my journey to let her know I would be delayed. The second time I called she told me that our visit would be short. “No duh!” I wanted to yell back at her, but instead I apologized and said I understood.
When I finally pulled up to my apartment in your town, you and the supervisor were already waiting for me. You ran over to me as I got out of the car and asked me if I had a present for you. When I replied that I did, you immediately wanted to look inside of my bag. I was able to convince you to wait until we got inside. You had your little green backpack with you, like always. It’s a cute backpack. It looks like a bird with a bright yellow beak and cheerful eyes. I opened up my apartment door and you zoomed past me inside. The supervisor followed close behind. I don’t like being late in general, but especially not for our visits. I like to arrive at least an hour early. I usually make a stop at the grocery store and get all of your favorite things, or at least things I think you’ll like. Then I go to my apartment and make some coffee so it’s ready for the supervisor, and straighten up the apartment a bit.
This time I went straight from a strenuous six hour drive to our visit. I’m sorry if it took me a few minutes to adjust and “arrive” mentally. I opened up my backpack and gave you your present, a little fork lift. Your eyes lit up a bit and you smiled. “A forklift!” you exclaimed. You told me you already had one but not one like that. I showed you how you could move the tines of the forklift up and down, and you took it from me and immediately put it to work like a pro. We played with the forklift for a while. Well, you played with the forklift, and I watched and asked you questions about it. This was perfectly okay with me. I was just happy to be in the same room as you.
At some point the supervisor asked me if I was planning on making dinner for you, and if I had anything in the apartment to make. I said yes, spaghetti for example. Her expectant tone made me feel as though I needed to ask you right then and there if you wanted anything to eat, and I suggested I make you spaghetti. You didn’t like this idea, however. You wanted to eat at home because there was a visitor coming for dinner at your house and you didn’t want to miss them. After I assured you that just because you ate something with me didn’t mean you would have to miss the visitor, you seemed at ease, and said you wanted muesli. Well, first you tried to tell me that the Oreo’s lying on the counter were perfectly suitable as a mid-afternoon meal. After I gave you the terrible news that no, they weren’t, you settled for Muesli.
Due to the delay in getting to you, I was unable to go grocery shopping, so I didn’t have any milk at the apartment. I let you know this, but it didn’t deter you in the slightest. You informed me that it was absolutely okay to eat muesli without milk. As I watched you eat the dry grain and cookies, I still felt bad. Still felt like I wasn’t giving you the best. The rational part of my brain knew that I really did have little control over the delays of the day, but the nagging feeling still wouldn’t leave me. Who gives their child dry muesli to eat? Only lazy nobody’s. Or so that inner voice was telling me.
After you ate most of the muesli, you wanted to sit on the windowsill of an open window in the living room and pretend to be a cat. You meowed at the passersby, who, save for one, all smiled and remarked something to the effect of “is that a cat I see?!” It warmed my heart to see their smiles when they spotted you. As the one gentleman who ignored you walked by, you turned to me and told me that that man must not be very nice. During the course of your cat life, I asked you why you meowed, to which you replied that one had to meow otherwise one couldn’t get enough air. The way you said this, in such a straightforward of-course-meows-are-necessary sort of way made me chuckle.
Then all too soon, a mere two hours after I had pulled up to the apartment’s door and you had rushed over to me, your mom showed up to take you home. I asked you for a fist bump goodbye, and you obliged. I said goodbye to you, your mom, and the supervisor and went inside. The apartment, which moments before had been filled with your meows, was now silent. I had a long drive back ahead of me. I quickly tidied up, locked the door, and drove off into the darkening night.