John Woodhouse Audubon:
Servus alces, Moose Deer. Old male & young. (1845-48)

" … a little heaven here in The Villa so close to the center of our universe."

I have no more steady companion than our formerly feral male cat Max. Since he became a member of our entourage five years ago, he has accumulated a fair raft of nicknames, if only because he's a member of our family and everybody in our family gets assigned at least one nom de famille. He sports several, including: Maximum, Moose, and Moosenator (pronounced Moose-EN-a-tor). Those who ask why I call him moose, I answer by insisting it was because of the antlers. Of course, The Moose does not actually have antlers, which might be my point. Perhaps the finest reason to assign nicknames in the first place involves the creation of an absurdist mythos around the old family unit. I imagine myself a budding Roald Dahl, writing a book about the wholly unlikely adventures of a typical American family who just happens to have a Moose and a Muse involved. I believe that every life requires some air of mythic mystery surrounding it. Mine features a Moose.

The Moosenator is clever, but not particularly intelligent. Within the first hour of coming here to our Villa Vatta Schmaltz, he'd figured out how to exit via a second-floor window, down the kitchen roof, hop onto the adjacent gazebo roof, then hop down onto the back deck railing, and from there into our fine backyard. He taught his much smarter but not nearly as clever sister, Molly, how to escape, too, and now that window remains their primary entry and exit point. We installed a cat door in the window, though neither of them has figured out how to operate it. They yowl when they want in or out, though in the summer, we just leave that window open overnight so they can come and go as they please.

Clever but not brilliant, The Moosenator is endearing in his cluelessness. He often fails to find his food, for instance, patiently waiting for me to serve it up, only to disappear as soon as I've plated it. I often have to chase him down as if he's never seen his food dish before, or leave it in a place he's likely to happen upon. Five or ten minutes later, he's usually somehow managed to discover it and crouches to appreciatively finish it. However, he never eats a whole portion. He's notorious for begging for supper only to leave half or more of it for later. By this time, the neighborhood opportunist cat, one we've labeled Tuxedo, or simply Tux, because he looks like he's dressed in black except for a white bow tie shape across his neck, has appeared and disappeared with the contents. Tux isn't above sneaking in the back door, or even through the cat door, which he knows how to operate. He has a home, yet he somehow manages to empty every errant supper plate and bowl in this place when he can sneak in.

The Moose wants to be Tux's friend, and I sometimes see them gamboling around the side yard. They're more often tussling, though, with Moose getting all territorial. Molly doesn't seem to believe in relationships with cats. She bats at anyone infringing upon her space, which is any place within her sight. She even chases off the Moose if he gets close. She's the alpha cat and Max the humbled beta. He doesn't seem to take anything very seriously except his early morning attention. Somewhere near the end of my early morning writing session, Max will return from his early morning rounds, looking for attention. He will yowl down the hall and enter my office like he's kicking down the door, complaining every inch of the way. I reach down and scratch his head, and he'll pirouette around for a second and third pass. He'll eventually jump up on my cluttered desk to face me off, standing inches from my face, still complaining. I'll usually stop writing then, and scratch his head, sometimes holding his head in one or both palms. He seems to appreciate that, though he also tries to nip me. I rub his cheeks before he usually sits behind my open laptop to survey the view out the big double-hung window overlooking the center of the universe.

Eventually, he'll coerce me into following him downstairs, an enthusiastic steeplechase which, I swear, one day, will trip me and send me tumbling to my death. We arrive in the kitchen where The Moose's dry food dish sits, freshly refilled, which draws his full attention. It's as if he just needed a witness. He eats, indifferent to my presence, so I shuffle back upstairs to finish my writing work. Later, he'll climb to the top of my office's cat tower and curl up to recover from his day so far. He often hops into my lap when I'm sitting up, trying to decide what to write that day, extracting more head scratches and face palms. He follows me closely through the day, but usually disappears around bedtime. Through the summer, he'll overnight outdoors, perhaps in his permanent nest beneath the black elderberry bush, which I admit is every bit as cool as any card table blanket fort I ever built as a kid. He sticks his head out a few times each day to check on my progress and generally monitors my activity more than I monitor his. He's a decent watchman.

I stick my head out the back deck slider first thing each morning in the summer and clap my hands together twice. That's my signal to let the Moosenator know I'm up and my lap's available if needed. He appears as if he's been waiting for the stage manager to prompt his entrance, and I feed him a few cat treats on top of the kitchen table. I taught both cats to eat on the table when they first arrived. The Muse still complains about it, which might only encourage me further. They need some quirky habits, or those cats can't belong in this family. Truth be told, I need them to have quirky habits more than they probably need to. They're just cats, though they're an integral part of my creative process. I don't think they suspect the world's going to Hell, as usual, this morning, because I've tried to provide a little heaven here in The Villa, so close to the center of our universe.

©2025 by David A. Schmaltz - all rights reserved

Tags: #FollowingChapters, #PureSchmaltz