Yesterday I was enjoying a meal, with only the cat and an old picture of the royal family for company, while quietly musing over my latest antique find, when I had an epiphany. This was not one of those enjoyable epiphanies when you suddenly remember a secret stash of money (or chocolate), but one those that makes you want to dive into a bucket of Ben and Jerrys and never return.
I quickly took stock of my surroundings to hopefully alleviate my fears.
One cat – check. A picture of the royal family- check. A dinner for one-check. Home alone on a weekend-check. Having recently found an enjoyable cat figurine on an antique fair-check.
I was living the life of an old lady.
Suddenly I could hear the chime of the Super Mario game, just as time has hit less than 100 seconds to finish. That sudden dread in the pit of your stomach when you just know you’ll just reach the castle in time, only to discover that the princess is in another one.
A survey of my own room did nothing but confirm my suspicions. Books. Pictures. Books about cats. Pictures of cats. The Cat itself, moseying around my feet (and being ever so cute) and I was talking to it. And the Cat was answering.
“How could this be”, I wondered, as I slowly sank into my old lady’s sitting chair.
I have a job now. I got colleagues, a desk and a paycheck. I bought an apartment (that hasn’t been built). How could I be more of an old cat-lady now than when I was a student last year?
As I was lovingly petting the cat, I mentally tried to retrace my steps, wondering where I had gone wrong.
True, I had an old lady’s job. I mean, teachers, no matter how cool we’d like to be or how much we funk up the t-shirt, at the core we’re all old ladies. We’re constantly surrounded by people reminding us of how old we are what with their hoodlumish ways, hooliganism strange languages and loud music and walking on my lawn(!)
Was it the lack of my own crib? Well, it wasn’t my fault the project hasn’t started yet-I could hardly go down to the dig-site with pitchforks and torches and tell the peasants to get working. It really shouldn’t count!
Perhaps it was my liking of old things? I thought vintage and retro, was a “fashion” – a life-style. There are certainly enough magazines to support that theory.
Was it, then, the liking of old cat-figurines? Was that my missteps that tipped the scale to old cat-lady hood?
I went to view my old-lady collection. Maybe, I thought, it will one day be worth a fortune. That would certainly be a redeeming quality, it wouldn't be a collection-it would be an investment!
