Hungry Cat won't live with us.

Hungry Cat, the stray who lives somewhere in our backyard, refuses to come in to live with us. He's scared and intimidated by my wife's cat, and irritated by my sister-in-law's cat. If he's brought in, he just sits at the door, waiting to be let out. And when he's let out, he runs, and we don't see him again for the day.

Hungry Cat will beg for affection if you're outside with him. He waits atiently for food in the morning, and will spend time hanging out on our back deck. He loves people; he loves attention. He just doesn't want to be inside with us. At what point do you start thinking, with tongue in cheek, "What's so wrong with us that a stray cat doesn't want to live with us?"

I used to have another blog, a LiveJournal, that I kept from the time shortly after my mother died to just around a year ago. I deleted it after I'd decided that it had served its purpose. On the surface, it was a convenient creative outlet. But I used it as a place to vent whatever was tearing up my gut at the time. I needed to work out a lot of things after my mother, then my father, died.

My sister told me that my parents died assuming that I'd hated them. They imagined that I had some type of resentment towards them, for what, I don't know. Neither did they. I never hated them at all, of course. I just didn't fit (another observation that my sister had made). There was something "off" about me. I was too smart for my own good, and thought I had every answer. They, being older and from a different time, had no idea, of course, how my life worked, or how life in general worked. But I was also creative and wanted to try things on my own. I was obsessed with making the imaginary tangible (something that affected my hobbies, my attitude towards art, as well as my religious faith). I was terrified of growing up to be an adult child. I never wanted to be the guy described in a line from a Billy Joel song, "You're 21 and still your mother makes your bed." So I made effort to separate myself from my family's influence.

And so, I needed time to sort all of this out. Guilt tore me up for years (and still hits me, now and again). I sorted things out as best as I could. And in the process, I discovered I really don't feel comfortable talking about myself any more. Some of that comes from not wanting to come across as whining on-line. No one likes a whiner, and for some reason, the on-line medium just seems to amplify the whiny-ness. There were also times I'd been told by some friends, "Stop with the emo crap on your blog, you're starting to sound like _________ ." (Insert name of whiny emo-kid of the day there) That was enough to get me to shut up. I also didn't feel the drive to share so much anymore. I don't know why, but it became too much of a chore.

The black-and-white cat in my backyard has it hard. We built a shelter for him, and we know he stays there when things get cold or wet. But he acts content. He doesn't hate us, not as far as we can tell. He's aloof. He does things he wants to. His refusal to come in and live with us still confuses my wife. I think I understand it.

(I just took a drink of water, and thought it tasted a little funny. I'm reminded now that my wife's cat likes to drink out of our drinking glasses, and has been sitting on the kitchen table behind me this entire time. Damn cat.)

And I'll do it again.

I gave my kid an AT-AT for Christmas. And its awesome. Over two feet high, with electronic sounds, a speeder-bike, a pilot...its amazing. Better than the AT-AT of my generation. Its not a symbol of my love, its not a way to connect with my youth. I'm a geek. So is my kid. He loves Star Wars. He likes cool toys. Here is the embodiment of all things cool about being a geek.

I bought it about a month ago, from a Wal-Mart in southern New Jersey. I'd been to several other stores, and they'd all been sold out. Yeah, there was a little panic. It was unavailable over the internet, according to my wife. This was the one big thing that the boy and I looked at earlier in the year, something that, when I saw it, I said, "Yeah, you're getting that for Christmas."

I'd turned a corner in the store, after seeing the empty shelf-space where the AT-AT should have been, and saw it there, on the floor. It was just there in the middle of the aisle. There were a few people around shopping, but no-one in the immediate vicinity of the toy. It could have been picked up by the folks with the kid looking at the Legos. It could have belonged to the nice people looking at paint.

Its possible someone had just put it down. If that's the case, they shouldn't have put it down.

I picked it up, and walked in a calm, patient manner to the registers (because running implies guilt). I paid for it, thanked the cashier, walked out to my car, put it in the cargo area, and drove away.

I doubt anyone had actually picked it up for a present. More likely, someone's child picked it up, brought it to their parents, and they said no. Or said they'd think about it, and dragged the kid away to look at things more reasonable (whatever reasonable people look at for their reasonable kids). I don't know. I don't really care. But it was an opportunity, and it was for the boy, and I took it. And I'll do it again.

My kid's a geek. He's putting together a huge Lego set right now. The AT-AT is next to the tree. Its huge, looks like some kid could ride it (there's actually something in the instruction manual that says, "Don't Ride It!"). In less than a half hour, we're going to watch the Doctor Who Christmas episode. And it'll be the best day ever.

I should tell you about Hungry Cat

I've never been a cat person.

I've had room-mates who were cat-people, except when it came to cleaning up after the beasts. Long story short, there were a couple of thousands of dollars to the apartment, they skipped the county, blah blah blah.

But now, we have two cats. My cat, Fasa, sleeps on my bed and occasionally wanders the house. Her cat, Ariel, bullies everyone in the house. My sister-in-law has a cat, too, who is very cat-like. I mean, he's the damn archetype of "Cat." He's also a jerk.

There's a stray who hangs out in our backyard. We call him "Hungry Cat" because, well, he's hungry.

My cat wakes me up by biting me, so I can give him food and water. My wife's cat attacks the hand that pets her. My sister-in-law's cat knocks over glasses filled with water, but only after he's gotten your attention. On the best days, they're a source of comfort and amusement. On the worst, they walk around like they own the place.

But you're not on this page to read about cats. And I'm not really here to write about cats. They're a part of the family, and a part that brings the family to a sane, calm level.

Let me tell you about something I see at work now and again. In one of the buildings I work in, I take lunch in a huge cafeteria. In the cafeteria, a group of women of Indian background meet every day for lunch. They fill the table with containers full of food, and share. Everyone brings something they cook from home, and they all share. As far as I know, they aren't at all related, except by their relationships at work. They just meet together every day, share food, share some time, and talk about stuff. How cool is that?

Does this have anything to do with my cats, or my home? Nope, just a little something I get to watch now and again. Its something that is nice and simple and grounds me, during a rough day at work.

Sort of like the cats. I imagine that, on their best days, they hang out together, and share stories about their little cat-lives. Maybe talk about what they see out the window now and again. I don't know.

I know that I have a wife that's awesome and brilliant. I have a kid that knows just enough to be dangerous, and whom I think has secret plans for world domination. And I have cats who act like they own the place.