From the Archives
The Story of
Simon.
On a sunny day in autumn, the dump in
Hollis, NH always seems to be packed with people. My mother has always said
that the dump is the social hub of the town. Nearly everyone in town passes
through about once a week: perhaps that’s what makes it such a popular
place for political
campaigns.
That Saturday had
political campaign leaflets and a group of schoolchildren selling candy bars to
raise money for the elementary school playground. As I pulled in and started
hauling recyclables, these kids asked if I would like to buy a candy bar for
their cause. I told them “in a minute,” as my hands were full and
people and automobiles were teeming around me, each more eager than the next to
get this smelly job out of the way and get on to more fun things.
Having dumped my paper goods,
I moved back to the table to ask the kids about their cause. Somewhere during
my fledgling work experience and law school, I became something like a
grandmother in my own eyes: I like to have kids explain to me what they are
selling and exactly why. Not that I have ever seen a child who is raising money
for a bad cause, I just like to know that they know what it is they are doing
beyond selling sugar.
I
didn’t get very far in my interrogation, because the mother of some of the
children was holding a tiny kitten in a fold of her sweatshirt. I was instantly
captivated, thinking that this must be a new addition to their family that they
couldn’t bear to leave at home while they spent the day outside.
I was wrong. The woman
explained to me that someone had abandoned a litter there at the dump and along
with passing out the political leaflets and selling chocolate her little group
was trying to get harried Hollis residents to take them home. With the skill of
a snake-oil saleswoman, she handed me the little tabby and smiled an angelic
smile of wonder as we both discovered that he had double paws with claws of
velcro.
The double paws did
it. As a child I had always wanted a cat with those four-wheel drive feet.
Within a few impulsive moments, I had made the decision to take him home with me
- forget about the fact that I had been living with Mom since my graduation from
school and subsequent job hunt. Forget about the fact that it’s not
practical to take on a pet when you don’t know where your life will lead
you in a month. I had to have
him.
As I looked up from this
appealing baby, everything slowed down a bit, movie-style. I saw other people
holding kittens - these people were laughing and talking with the children,
infected by the kids’ energetic enthusiasm and softened by exposure to the
tiny felines. Suddenly, other people didn’t seem to be in such a hurry to
get the Saturday dump run over with. They smiled at me, as my new little tyrant
scrambled up to my shoulder. The kids offered to help me with my bottles. A
man traded me a cardboard box that was sturdier than the hastily reconstructed
one from my own trunk. Surrounded by garbage and noise, the helpfulness and
good cheer of the people of my hometown reminded me of the good things of small
town life.
Simon is grown now
- he sits on my lap with typical feline stolidity, no longer that purring baby
who rolled over onto his back and waved outsized, oven-mitt paws at my distant
face. But he still looks up at me with steady, trusting eyes. He is a lasting
reminder of my hometown. Where else could you go to the dump and come home with
a baby?
Posted: Tuesday - May 31, 2005 at 07:36 AM
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