Part 2: REALLY CATCHING THE CAT

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Aug 14

This summer, George and Blaze were in Williamstown for over a month. Blaze stayed a week longer than George due to the cat. George kept extending his stay also. I think he likes it here and he would have stayed even longer but there was the matter of the building permit in LA, which felt like it might need an in-person fire-survivor’s presence.

Blaze and I tried once more to catch the cat on the bike path. It was again at night, which like the time before felt clandestine and had that same kid-nappy vibe. Blaze thought I was too aggressive last time. I thought she was not aggressive enough. This time, however, I did not intervene, although I did wear oven mitts.

Blaze was quiet and slow and kind and the cat clearly loved her but Blaze was also unclear how to be decisive and essentially shove the cat into the open crate. The cat did not want to be gently coaxed into the crate. This was all a less stressful encounter than before - but off-putting enough for the cat to dart back into the woods when she’d had enough.

This time, there were no scratches or grumbling about who did what. We were quiet. Defeated. Blaze got back on her bike. I got back in my car with the empty crate. We had come to accept the fact that this might have been it. We could not catch a cat who did not want to be caught.

We had administered flea medication, fed treats and kibble, and tried our best to be alluring. We had tried the hard approach, the soft approach. Blaze and I gave up. The next morning, I returned the cat carrier to my neighbor Sally’s porch. George was VERY relieved. I told him we didn’t have to tell Blaze, “no.” The cat did it. So we were safe.

Still, every night as it got dark, I’d ask Blaze, “Have you fed the cat?” Most nights, the cat was waiting for her. One rainy night, Blaze said she couldn’t find the cat. We all were worried - but also resigned. This was rural life, I guess, we should get used to it. This cat was not actually meant to be ours. This cat had not actually chosen us. Perhaps the cat was also someone else’s.

George flew back to Santa Barbara a week or so before Blaze did. Even though we had already given up, all the way to the airport, George kept insisting that Blaze should NOT take the cat back to Santa Barbara in a cat carrier. He wanted no surprises. I assured him again and again that there would be no cat on the airplane with Blaze in a week’s time.

A few days later, Catherine arrived for a long weekend visit. Catherine was aghast. “What!? There’s a stray cat on the bike trail?!”

We told her generally where the cat would be found - off the back patio of the last apartment that faced the parking lot. I showed her my Next Door post. I showed her the scabs on my arms. I offered the idea that perhaps the cat was a happy outdoor cat that belonged to someone else?

The next day, unbeknownst to Blaze, who was sleeping in, and me, who was walking the dogs and now avoiding that general area of the bike path, Catherine was able to visit with the cat.

That evening, a hasty decision was made. We still had treats. The garage was still tricked out. We would give this whole shebang one more try. We would prove that we could not catch a cat who did not want to be caught.

In keeping with our previous attempts, it was almost 8:30 at night. I texted my neighbor, Sally. “I think we might try again. Coming over for the crate…”

“Good luck!” Sally wrote back. “Did you grab some catnip?”

Things moved quickly after that.

Catherine calls herself a “winner” even though she is a nonathletic person. As I have written about earlier, with all the LA-building permit delays, she even threatened to get “the guy” on the phone and solve this for us all. “I’m a winner,” she said, claiming that she alone could get this done, when the rest of us had failed (or speaking for myself, not even tried). While sometimes over-the-top with her ambition, I will admit, Catherine is decisive, does not suffer fools lightly and is definitely someone who can get shit done. She is not gentle and quiet. Perfect for catching a cat.

Avoiding the fence obstruction, double-parked at the entrance to the bike path with the hazards on, in the “getaway car,” I texted Sally (in response to the catnip suggestion), “I think Blaze has some on her bike. Previous attempts were a bust. But it helps that there are three of us in the endeavor. Feels like a bank heist!”

Far from the backyard apartment patios where someone might legitimately confront us for trespassing with an intent to steal their cat, I rolled down my window to hear if there were any screams and kept looking in my rearview mirror. The night was quiet except for my blinking hazards. It felt like forever.

Soon enough, though, I had visuals: Blaze was pedaling fast on her bike and Catherine ran towards the car with a crate now bearing the weight of a skinny cat inside. Catherine and the crate piled into the back seat. If memory serves, she wasn’t whispering when she told me to “Go! Go!” before her door was even closed. As instructed, I peeled out of there - only to put on the brakes three blocks away to make the tight right into our alley. The cat was surprisingly quiet through all this.

While I didn’t see the actual “catch,” I was told Catherine missed only once. On her second try, she “swooped” the cat into the top loading carrier. No scratches.

The cat (we thought it was a “she” given Blaze’s research on “the space between holes” - her words not mine) spent her first night in the unfinished garage, which I had tricked out earlier with a cat box and dog bed and food and water. She chose to hide in a corner behind boxes, while Catherine regaled us with the art of the “swoop” and how it wasn’t a shove or a push - but a two-handed gliding gesture. After Catherine and I went to bed for the night, Blaze was able to coax the cat out and hang out with her on the dog bed for a while.

Night two, Blaze thought the cat should be in Blaze’s room (which we had painstakingly furnished with vintage IKEA and Marimekko) which meant moving all the cat stuff. In empathetic Blaze fashion, she began by picking the cat up gently, and stroking her in her arms. She actually thought she might be able to avoid the crate altogether and carry the cat across the backyard and up two flights of stairs. Blaze didn’t make it out of the garage.

While I’m sure she prefers a slow, gentle, empathetic Blaze, for a move, this cat needs someone who swoops. Catherine inserted herself again for the win, swooped the cat into the crate (on the first try). I carried her up to the third floor, Blaze’s room and her new wing - very much upgraded accommodations to being on her own on the bike path or in the garage – and she calmed down considerably. Writing this now, I marvel at how far we have come.

Blaze insisted we needed more scratching things, a cat tree, and a water fountain (versus a water bowl). Amazon was helpful in these matters. Also a child gate. And a crate so we don’t have to borrow my neighbor Sally’s, with whom I shared some recent photos of our progress. Sally wrote back, “She doesn’t know it yet, but she just won the stray cat lottery.”

While Catherine returned to her internship in New York, Blaze extended her stay to be here through the vet visit, which was on a Tuesday. At the vet, we had our gender reveal (confirmed: female) and dosed the cat up with several shots, including the more “natural” kind of rabies vaccine that did not also cause some kind of cat cancer but would require a booster. As for the age, it is hard to be exact with cats apparently. The vet estimated that she was about a year and half old. I felt a wave of sympathy for the cat, who likely had survived two winters outside and on her own. And then there’d been the Trap-Spaying-Releasing business, which included her ear being “tipped.” What a life!

The vet randomly picked January 20, 2025 for her birthday. I suggested they move it to January 7, 2025 - fire day - or January 8, 2025 - my 56th birthday and the day we learned we lost everything. The dates seared in my memory.

Before we left, it was confirmed that no, Blaze could not take the cat back with her on the airplane the next day as a booster shot would be required in three weeks, and also the airline would require a health certificate and likely the cat would need medication to travel that far without incident.

On Wednesday, I drove a sullen Blaze to the Albany airport. We were late heading out - with lots of expletives about my waiting for her in the car “doing nothing” and also, strangely, her wanting me to leave her alone and get out of her way. These are the things I think about when I hear of new parents being very specific about how they fold their laundry or how to keep to a prescribed snack schedule. I think to myself, that’s great - keep it up as long as you can.

Thankfully, Blaze’s flight was delayed, but it was still hit or miss whether she would make it. I had already parked long enough to retrieve the Florida water and perfume purchased in Hudson, as they were too large to carry on and we had missed the bag-check cut off. I drove around the airport in circles, waiting to see if she would get through security. (She did eventually.)

Meanwhile, I missed a call from the vet about the cat, whom Catherine would eventually name Eloise but was still officially “?” in the records. The message said that “?” had tapeworms. While not contagious to humans or other animals, tapeworms come from eating a live infected flea, likely from a rodent on the bike path. Yikes! And gross. The tapeworms could be treated in one of two ways - topical or with a pill. I chose both, leaving the house the next morning to get to the vet’s office when it opened so we could begin right away.

While I have never considered myself a cat person – dogs seem more loyal and any furniture destruction seems relatively contained with blankets, save for the occasional upset stomach – I have lived with cats before.

First there was Tillie when I was 5 or 6, which I’m surprised Catherine didn’t declare we should name our current cat, as the origin of the name was my middle name “Tilden” and also some relatively famous ancestors. (Catherine was delighted to see Samuel J. recently portrayed by Larry David.)

In any event, we passed on that. Biscuit was my second cat. Tillie’s son. According to Blaze, our sweet cat spends a lot of time “making biscuits” (kneading) which led me to consider “Baker” as a name, but that was also the name of one of Blaze’s nemesis / bullies in elementary school, so that was a nonstarter.

Despite being new on the scene and new to the cat, having spent most of her summer in New York, Catherine declared she would be named “Eloise” and we all fell into line. Catherine would say she has a gift with names -- the rest of us might say it’s more that she has a gift of getting her way.

At least the vet can now remove the “?” for our appointments.

Does she know her name Catherine asks? I don’t think it’s like with a dog, I answer. They don’t really come when you call.

Life is generally more complicated now due to Eloise, whom I mostly call “the cat,” or “sweet cat,” but also Eloise, and mama, and miso miso. My rescue german shepherds, Milo and Serena, whine at the bottom of the stairs leading up to the third floor. I am deeply worried that their bloodlust for squirrels will transfer to Eloise. The second dog crate I ordered is delayed. While I wait for its delivery, we are in a holding pattern. I divide my time between my office upstairs with the cat and my life downstairs with the dogs. Peaceful, but for the occasional yelp downstairs when Eloise is particularly playful and the dogs know something is up.

What happens next? I feel like I’ve asked that question a lot the past year and a half, post fire. I rarely have an answer. No, I’m not a “cat person” per se - but I’m also not an animal-suffering person. Yes, a cat in the mix is absolutely a complicating factor. But life lately is rather complicated anyway and what’s one more living breathing creature in the mix really? Maybe the cat did choose us after all - she just wanted us to prove it.

While I take it all “day by day,” Eloise is certainly settling in. It sure feels like a “done deal,” even when I have a hard time believing in the permanence of anything post-fire. For a feral cat, Eloise is low key. She likes my Palisades playlist on repeat. She greets me when I ascend the stairs to the third floor because I feed her on most visits. Nothing fancy - Meow Mix pate. Perhaps also one of those treat sticks. When I’m in my office, she has a favorite chair in the room just outside, where she sleeps and sometimes watches me work.

When visiting the homes of die-hard cat people, I have to admit to being generally repulsed at the smell of a cat box and alarmed at shredded furniture. While up here on the third floor, we don’t have much of anything Eloise could destroy, we hope to have nice furniture in the fullness of time - and come to think of it, the sectional off the kitchen is new from the showroom floor. She could certainly do some damage to it. (Amazon knows what I am thinking - and sends me ads for all measure of cat furniture work-arounds.) I sure hope having a cat and nice furniture are not mutually exclusive.

My bias / impression was confirmed when I jokingly offered Eloise to a woman in my yoga class who said she used to have cats. “I have one for you!” She guffawed and said, “Oh no! We have nice furniture now. I like my nice furniture.”

Meanwhile Eloise does not like any of the fancy cat things I purchased (the cat tree, the scratching posts). She’ll eat out of both a shallow and regular bowl, even though Blaze insisted we buy the shallow one to prevent “whisker fatigue.” Even when I try to accommodate her preferences, a pad on a chair with a homemade toy - she instead chooses the carpet. She looks askance at the bubbling water fountain, drinking only from a bowl. She mostly likes the basic stuff, scratching the cardboard from the hardware store, “making biscuits” on a blanket, and destroying the toy custom-made with a single sock, catnip, and hairband.

On the most important matter, Eloise has mostly used her stainless steel cat box - except once each in the neighbor’s crate and my replacement crate. She also pooped in my office once. But otherwise! All things are good. I’ve done some experimenting with litter. There is the corn cat litter and the cat litter made by some guy who was a veterinarian. I realized the worst smell coming from the cat box was actually the scented litter we got from the Stop ‘n Shop, so I’m thrilled to be rid of that.

I am a little worried that I may be growing accustomed to the smell, if there is any. I am reminded of how, when I’d come home from a long filming trip, days away in some sterile Courtyard Marriott in some place somewhere, all those trips lugging my equipment and suitcases back into the house in Pacific Palisades, finally home, crossing the threshold, I was often hit with a wave of “dog smell.” Miraculously, by the next morning and by doing absolutely nothing, the smell was gone.

Maybe it’s the case that Eloise is an odorless cat. Or maybe a few weeks into all this, among the drying herbs, the soup on the stove, the candles and dog towels, she is now part of what make this Williamstown house smell like home.