Waiting for godot
Many are the posts I have written about the critters that come into my backyard from the top of the East Gate: basically 4 cats and 1 opossum. My attention was drawn to one cat that I began to make friends with when I encountered it in my back yard; it seemed quite friendly then and even stepped into my house on one occasion. He seemed not to belong to any human - no collar, out at odd hours, and hungry - and so I called him “Nekko” which is just “cat” in Japanese; I thought “cat” in English was too cold, but “Nekko” because it was a kind of camouflaged cold it kept me on the right side of not bonding too closely with this uninvited guest.
I had looked forward to Nekko visits although they became few and far between. Concerned for him, I began to check my Ring camera for traces of his entry when I wasn’t there. And another world opened up to me: my backyard while I was sleeping at night. There were plenty of cats that came over the East Gate right under the camera. But I was most pleased when I saw Nekko’s stockinged feet on the camera footage.
As time went on I had the overwhelming urge to feed Nekko. Of all the cats my Ring camera picked up, Nekko seems the thinnest and at one point it looked like he had a limp. I wasn’t encountering Nekko outside anymore. Neighbors were talking about all the coyotes they were seeing. The Ring camera began to take on importance, a sighting of Nekko confirmed his continued existence.
I began to reward his cameo appearances with 5 small cat bits, treats for staying alive, treats for visiting. And although Nekko and I even established a kind of schedule the other critters soon caught on and often ate all the treats I left for Nekko when Nekko fell off schedule. I was happy to feed Nekko some small morsel of nutrition and when the other cats intercepted the hand off, I was okay with that too. But when I saw the opposum eating Nekko’s treats I reacted and stopped leaving them altogether. I decided that if Nekko wanted a cat treat, he could visit me when I was out and about. After all, he associated treats with my East Gate.
This little game I voluntarily played, like most games, seemed pointless. And then it seemed idiotic: I did not want to become the old lady that feeds the cats. Also, one of the cats that visits - the brindle cat - has a collar and I didn’t want to be feeding a cat that belongs to a human. It all became entangled in melodrama. I stopped leaving treats and I stopped looking at the Ring footage for the East Gate.
This morning my ipad notified me that activity in my backyard at 7am was picked upon my Ring camera: I took a look. It showed Nekko crossing my back deck, he looked so thin. But I’m not getting into the treat leaving business again. Leaving treats for Santa Claus was more rewarding, but I don’t do that either.
I looked back at the overnight footage and saw the other cats too, looking for the treats that have not been there for the past month. I commiserate with them as a human that looks for a visit from daytime Nekko: I too am looking for what is not there. And that realization - that I’m looking for something that is not there - has jolted me. Is this the first step into the dreaded dementia? Am I losing my marbles?
Well, it seems that I am often looking for what is not there. Of course, if I knew for sure it was not there I doubt I’d be looking there. But most times when I’m looking for what is not there, there is some promise that it might be there and that is why I’m looking. When I was young it was letters in the mail. I might look everyday at the post box; looking for something that is not there, but this behavior of a silly young girl is acceptable since a letter MIGHT be there. Letters when they are there prove the promise. We have a lot of sayings about things like this: waiting for a phone to ring will not make it ring (who waits for a phone to ring anymore!!!), or watching a pot will not make it boil, and so on.
And lest I delve into probability theory here, suffice it to say why waste time on looking for something that is not there when I could be painting my 24’ dragon!