Julie Pippert: Using My Words

When Jon and I got married, we had four cats . The oldest cat was my cat, CiCi. CiCi was perfectly happy being my only cat. She was, if I am honest, completely and utterly spoiled rotten. She was delightful to me, and slow to warm (sometimes never warm) to others. Affection from CiCi was treasured because this rescue cat held it in reserve like gold. How things were mattered a great deal to her, therefore she was, although by far the smallest (but scrappiest) cat at maybe 5 lbs soaking wet, the Alpha Cat in our tribe of tiger. Her happy only status was interrupted by the arrival of Amber, who my ex found and brought home. I got permanent "custody" of her as well. So when Jon and I got married, I had two cats (free and clear), and he had two kittens. CiCi had tolerated Amber's arrival, mainly because she was such a scaredy cat who was no threat that it wasn't even funny. The kittens, however, disrupted her life and were not welcome. Neither was Jon, in her view. He was...

I'm in UR dining room shittin' on UR rug. When my husband and I began dating in 1991---versus when we met (1988), the time apart (1989-1990), the time of "friendship" (1990), the time of "confusion" (late 1990-early 1991), Mardi Gras (1991), and actual "Love it or leave it dude," (1991)---we were single adults with our own apartments, very independent. I had acquired two cats. Cat 1, CiCi, adopted me by "Get the eff away from me crazy lady, no seriously do not touch me bitch!" default. She was a scrawny half-dead slightly past kittenhood cat that the vet encouraged me to Do the Humane Thing for. But I believed in fate. I got off the bus that day at that stop at that time, and looked to the right, instead of to the usual left. I saw her chasing a butterfly and something spoke to my soul. I walked over, looked her in the eye, said, "Do you want the Sweet Life? If yes, let me me pick you up." And she did. But not too easily. She h...

It all started the month before Christmas with the first indications of a break-in to our house. I'm a pretty light sleeper, especially after having kids. One night, some noises downstairs woke me. It sounded like someone was opening the pantry. Persistence , I thought, annoyed, on another midnight food raid . As I worked to open my burning, exhausted eyes, and convince my body It Had to Get Up and Go Save the Baby, I spared one irritated moment to wonder whether we had properly closed and latched the pantry before bed. When I got downstairs, the utility room and kitchen were trashed. And Persistence was upstairs asleep in her bed. I called my husband down. After much investigation, we decided our hyperthyroid cat Bubba must have lost his last noodle and gone on a bender. This theory held up in that every single morning that we got up, the cat bowl (filled completely the night before) was totally empty, and someone had been biting his way into the dog food bag and cat food containe...