This story about the first "pet cat" just keeps hanging around. Like a hungry cat. As I do with hungry cats, I tired to ignore it, and finally failed. So here it is, having wheedled its way into the blog. You can't outwait a cat. They are experts. They spend most of their lives waiting. It only looks like they're sleeping. I've rarely been catless, though I've never once sought a cat out. I'm not sure if that says more about cats or about me.

We are currently down to one cat. Two, if you count Rachel's ashes in the tin on the shelf a few feet from my desk.I have a feeling I have mentioned Rachel's remains before. Worrisome. Maybe her cat soul intersects the earthly plane most strongly where her ashes are, in the same way that the incorporeal essence of Saints is said to linger in the vicinity of their relics.

I wonder if the flower gardens behind my grandparents' house came alive after midnight with the wandering shades of the generations of pet cats and dogs buried in the phlox, at the foot of the arbor, and behind the rock garden? If so, do they all float aimlessly over the featureleess lawns with which successive owners have replaced the gardens?

This version of the story quotes Melinda Zeder of the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History as saying, "In lieu of finding a bell around its neck, this is about as solid evidence as one can have that cats held a special place in the lives and afterlives of residents of this site,"

Indeed, or perhaps it was more a matter of the -- "Cursed criminal. For all your terrible deads you are hereby sentences to be executed and buried for eternity with a cat."