Roadkill Cafe, Part 12

At some point I started saying that it was Ribsy who led me around, when I originally said it was Foxy who took that honor.  Things change here.  The Roadkill Café is a reflection of the life its visitors once knew, but things change.  That’s the whole point.

Barky was the first one to come.  He says it existed before then, but I have my doubts.  He says a lot of things.  The first time I saw him, he didn’t say anything.  The more I asked Ribsy and Foxy about him, the more I convinced them to finally let me meet him.  And when I did, I realized I’d seen him before.  He was the first one I met on the road, the one I took, the one that took me to the Roadkill Café.

He was left on his side, on a sidewalk.  I started thinking about how he got there.  I imagined that he was run over, and the driver thought enough to stop the care and put him someplace dignified.  I imagined that he died in his owner’s home, and was left here, someplace undignified.  I imagine that he’d grown sick, and that his owner left him there, left him to die on his own.  I imagined that he’d run away, and finally he could go no further, and so lay down and waited for the end.

Somehow he ended up at the Roadkill Café.  The end wasn’t the end.  I’ve called it limbo and I’ve suggested purgatory, and there’s a difference between the two.  Limbo is a place you end up when there is no sure way to know where you really ought to be.  I used to think the Roadkill Café was a limbo.  Now I lean more toward purgatory, if anything.  Well, I did.  Purgatory is a place you go to lose your baggage, the things you couldn’t let go of from some previous life.  It implies that you want to forget, that you can, that you need to.

They say that humans have the advantage over animals because they remember, and the greatest curse is to lose that gift, because knowledge breeds innovation, the ability to improve your life, to impact the world, to make a difference.  It’s all about ego, really.  Animals don’t have ego.  They live by instinct.  They adapt and take advantage of circumstances, but they’re incapable of human innovation, the spark of genius.  They can’t love?

I think I learned differently.  Barky’s story was everything I imagined it to be.  It was a horrible tragedy.  He told me he thought about it every day, and he kept going, settled into the heartache, and decided to never leave the Roadkill Café, and welcomed every new patron personally.  He kept to himself, though, and avoided humans, never called me Comrade.  I guess he didn’t have to.

Ribsy, who decomposed on the side of a road, took charge.  He relished the opportunity.  He spent the most time of anyone with me, and I used to take it for granted.  I guess what I’m saying is, I don’t do that anymore.

What does it all mean?  I guess I don’t want to answer that.  I met a lot of friends there, heard a lot of stories, and they were all a little sad, but they were also pretty happy, too, even if in ways some people will find a little hard to understand.  I guess if there’s a point, that’s it.

I wanted to tell their story right away, but I was cautioned by all of them.  They all pulled me aside, privately, and it was like a conspiracy.  I’m certain that none of them consulted each other, that it was a decision each of them made on their own.  I guess that says something, too, maybe explains something about heartbreak and life and something about love.  They trusted me, because I guess I allowed them to.  It grew to be overwhelming, really.  What was I supposed to do with it?  I guess, when I was ready, when I felt the time was right, when it made sense, to share it.  Well, and then here we are again, at the beginning...

Roadkill Cafe, Part 11

Chewy wasn’t hard to find.  He was all over the place, begging for someone to play with him.  He was so desperate, or perhaps took his name so seriously, that he chewed everything and everyone in sight.

Now, this might be considered endearing, and actually was, but the problem is, most living things don’t much like to be chewed.

The fact that Chewy himself didn’t seem to mind this distinction was part of his charm.  Yes, it was also annoying.

He started out small, as any puppy does, but he was destined to be a big dog, and this was no more evident than in the size of his paws.  They were, matter of fact, quite outsized, as was his need for love.  He was anxious about it, and didn’t take “no” for an answer, even when he got it, repeatedly.  In fact, he was sent into exile, and found the world suddenly more accommodating.  Suddenly all the rules shifted in his favor.  He had everywhere to roam, and all the dogs gravitated to him, wanted to be in his posse, looked up to and respected him.  Maybe it was because he was coming more and more into himself, was no longer so gawky, and directed his chewing to more specific objects…I don’t know.  I expect that it had less to do with Chewy changing so much as the world changing around him.

Had he really been so bad?  Did all he need was some new context?  Sometimes that’s the answer, and he was lucky enough to find it.  That’s what a dog’s life can be like.

Why this one, I asked Ribsy, and he looked away, suddenly anxious.  I wanted some answers.  I figured I deserved some.  I’d seen a lot now, and figured I knew something.

Does Chewy know any more now than he did before? Ribsy asked, and then trotted away.

Well, I don’t know how to answer that, I confessed.  According to you, it doesn’t really matter.

And it doesn’t, Ribsy said.

Ain’t that the truth, Foxy added.  I didn’t know when he’d returned, but I guess that’s Foxy.

Just tell me what it all means, I pleaded with them.  Tell me why any of them were at the Roadkill Café, why Champ, why Floyd, why Freckles, why Smokie and Hazel, why Rom and Jules, why Boo, why Remus and Tonks, why Jack and Jill, why Chewy…They don’t seem to do anything.  They don’t seem to have a purpose.  Is this some kind of purgatory?

Well, now that you mention it…

Roadkill Cafe, Part 10

Jack fell down and broke his crown, and Jill came tumbling after.

Well, that’s how the nursery rhyme goes.  Turns out when you combine two names in any form, it’s bound to be accurate.  That’s what I learned when I met Jack and Jill, a couple of dogs.  Jack came first, and he always moved first, and Jill was always sure to follow.  They were bad influences on each other, a couple of miscreants.  They were also incredibly lovable.

What they didn’t know and didn’t seem to care about was that they were always getting in each other’s way, and only noticed when they both wanted to play with the same toy.  They were leapers, always leaping, always excitable, always energized, except when they settled down for a snooze, and then they were perfect little angels.

They inhabited their own world.  That’s the only way to explain it.  Somehow they got around to a form of independence where they were happy to amuse themselves, and they always seemed to have some funny thought in their heads, except when someone came around and gave them what they wanted, and then they were jubilant about that, too, always so pleased with the world, even when it denied them their heart’s content.

(Pay attention to that, Ribsy told me.)

Some would say they were full of animal instincts, and were dominated by them even when it seemed were almost civilized, Jack with his crossed paws, Jill with all her beguiling tricks, even that creepy smile, using her eyes and her low-crawling ability and a lethal tongue to warm anyone over.  But Jill’s talents worked a little too well, the opposite of Hazel, an object lesson in extremes, so that she, too, disappeared.

But they were both back together at the Roadkill Café.  It was inconceivable to think of Jack without Jill, even though it’s happened once and it happened again and two can also be one just as much as two, a mystery of the universe.  This was a place where reality was folded in on itself, and only the most pure forms of nature existed, only truths, no more hiding.  Jack looked serious, Jill snuggled beside him, a couple of demure figures, the opposite and yet the same as they had always been.  Opposites are always equal, especially here.

Roadkill Cafe, Part 9

Sometimes you can make cameo appearances in your own life.  Such is the story of Remus and Tonks, two more cats who stand like guardians in a household growing with children.  How cats survive in a house like that is by being as absent as possible. 

Without knowing that they’re even there, you might not even know these two even exist.  They’re silent predators of their own peace, existing in a world of wonders and content to keep to themselves, except when they take the lay of the land, small excursions like benevolent explorers to see what’s out there, free or perhaps full of ego, so that you love them without needing much in return.

They are cats, after all.

Ribsy told me there was a lot to learn from Remus and Tonks, much that was relevant to the mystery of Barky, how fine a razor’s edge all animals creep along, from independence and interdependence to the awareness of those around them and the need to retain boundaries.  Cats in particular put the whole phenomenon in sharp relief, needing and demanding much in exchange for only a little.  Some people equate pets to infants, but it’s an artificial relationship, derived from a false analysis.  A cat as much as a dog exhibits a hundred times a day its instincts of self-preservation.  They are captives of luxury, but captives all the same.  The trick is to develop a bond, which in some animals is easier than in others, and the reason they become pets.  Cats may seem aloof, but they know what it means to care for humans.  They have a much simpler equation than most animals:

Distance/Time = Love

Remus and Tonks figured out the art and science of it, not just the math.  They were regular students of the game, and they excelled in their classroom, which is sometimes called life.

The balance of the equation is always to know when space does not become neglect.  Space is a mutual designation, whereas neglect is the absence of space, crosses the bounds of cruelty and constitutes a betrayal.  Ribsy knew about that, and if he didn’t much want to talk about it.  He said Barky knew about it, too.  It was the reason the Roadkill Café existed to begin with.  It was a destination that was defined by space, which is why it attracted so many visitors, and why so many of them chose to stay.  It reminded them of home, or at least what it was supposed to be.

Standing sentinel?  Well, none other than Remus and Tonks.  It only made sense.  They probably wouldn’t have it any other way.

Roadkill Cafe, Part 8

There will always be a legion of stories concerning those who make the biggest impact on your life, because that is how you remember them, not by your memories, but your ability to remember stories about them.  That’s the stuff of history.

If I become a little more poetic, it’s because that’s what Boo inspires.

In some ways, she was a typical cat.  In many ways, she was the prototypical cat.  Plenty of people say that kind of thing about beloved pets, but Boo transcended just about everything.  She reshaped the world around her, defying all logic and expectation, and at the end of the day really just wanted to catch a little sleep.

There are so many stories to tell about her, so many legends, and maybe some of them are even true, but what’s the point of truth, anyway?  It binds you, and it tells you nothing that you didn’t already know.  Truth is only what you can prove.  Think of Boo as a scientific curiosity, like string theory.

She was born with a groovy mutation, a set of yellow and blue eyes, and a vocal box that denied her the ability to meow.  What she actually did was something like a chirp, a short utterance that could sound like a protest or an affirmation, depending on her mood, so that she always took part in the conversation, though keeping her most intimate secrets to herself.  In that regard, she was aloof, even at the Roadkill Café, but the truth is there was never a more congenial creature in all of creation.

She had her quirks, yes, and fairly routine enemies.  She liked the gravy in a cat treat more than the meat, and her paws were deadly, especially if you were a dog two sizes too big (though this did not prevent an unexpected meeting one day, when she fell on this dog’s head). 

She owned a set of People Suits, in which she could participate on reality TV game shows, concealing her secret to almost everyone, giving herself away only in subtleties, being inordinately clumsy or, yes, chirping with visiting friends.  It sounds like nonsense, but these are stories.

Her mortal enemy, now trapped in a water tank, presaged her coming in his efforts to tear apart tennis balls, always resulting in a distinctive rictus.  He stopped making them once she appeared.

She once blotted out the sun for a couple of ants, stole a toy blaster to defend her food, chewed on the weapon of another plastic figure, a villain, and it was said that she knew exactly what she was doing.  She was just like any other cat, except preternaturally so.  She knew a cat named Ryan who lit his whiskers, and then ducked his head in a toilet.  She enjoyed Ariel’s water.  Ariel was a fish.  She once got her paw stuck on the string of a cat toy, and that’s why she didn’t play with cat toys.  She could make her own fun.  She also didn’t bother with catnip.  She was straightedge all the way.

She liked to judge just about everyone, taking a tall perch and staring at the spectacle beneath her.  It was not wise to approach her from this position.  Again, just like any other cat, but so much more.  She opened up a shop with a disclaimer and a full liability waiver, allowing anyone to pet her, just once and then leave.  She made good money.  She sometimes considered working for the Red Cross.

She loved voraciously, and quietly despised just as passionately.  She could make toy cars fly, and then make a hot pursuit.  She knew when it was Gravy Day and wouldn’t let anyone forget it.  She wanted badly to be outside, but always scurried back in, especially if it was wet there.  She could climb and did any surface, even if she clearly thought about how to make it happen sometimes.  You could trick her into licking you if she was grooming herself.  She let herself sample whatever looked good among the people food.  Again, not so different, but the more time you spent with her, the more indispensible her existence became, even if she chose to curl up next to rather than on you.  It was all good.

She lost a fang and started to scowl.  She was a pirate, a bear, the day after tomorrow, had a scary name borrowed from an charming movie, responded in the early years enthusiastically to it, grew tired of it, never forgot it, never let you forget her, never let you overlook her.

Yeah, she was just like a regular cat, except she was extraordinary.  Imagine coming across Boo randomly.  In a place like the Roadkill Café, she was queen, like everywhere else, but wasn’t too proud to ask for a little love, maybe with a head butt, if you were lucky.  She was pure white, with just a little gray mixed at the top of her head, a perfect angel, a sweat little devil, ready to corrupt you.

That’s what this is all about, I thought to myself, coming across her, what they were all trying to teach me, how any of it makes sense, how anything makes sense, a sentinel of liberty and independence, ready to give it all up in a heartbeat, if you let her.

Roadkill Cafe, Part 7

They had a little trouble knowing what to call themselves (this was a bigger problem for Freckles, but that’s a different story entirely), but they commonly called themselves Rom and Jules, which were short for Romeo and Juliet.

Rom and Jules could be teddy bears, and they could also be intimidating; it all depended.  For those who really knew them, they were teddy bears, and that’s what really counts.  Jules, for instance, was known for being testier with strangers, but she also once goofed off behind a Christmas tree, playing a game of peek-a-boo, or maybe she just wanted to go outside and the tree was in the way.  Either way, that incident kind of came to define her, and at the Roadkill Café, she wasn’t too shy to recreate it, now that she was always at ease, and no longer refraining from working at her Eat List.

The Eat List is a tradition among dogs, from the old days and perhaps alternate lives in which they really did need to protect their human companions with their lives.  It’s the imaginary itinerary for eliminating threats, which can shift according to mood and provocation.  And actually, come to think of it, Freckles had the biggest one of that, too.  You’d never have known it, unless you knew it.  Dogs say a lot with their eyes, too.

I mentioned the term “human companion,” you’ll note, rather than “master” or “owner” or any other somesuch nonsense.  This is what dogs, especially, really think about humans they share a home with.  They don’t tend to be shy, do they?  They own the home in ways some humans might understand, and others won’t.  Rom and Jules would help you understand in short order.

Mostly they lounged around, putting their bulk and weight aside.  They were probably the happiest of any patrons in the place, and seemed to ignore anyone else, which was not something they’d been able to do in their earlier lives.  No, if they’d been in a place like this before, they assured me, there’d be a lot of noise, a lot of scrambling, and a lot of fun!  It’s called being sociable.

I asked Ribsy what he thought of the pair of them, and he said they meant no harm, and I guess he was referring to Rom and Jules as a whole, and not necessarily here or there, and that’s what I knew about them before I knew them, and when I got to know them, I understood what he meant.  That sounds a little roundabout, but that’s the kind of response dogs like that can generate.

My advice: the truth will out.  Even if Jules wants to make you think one thing, if you give her the chance she’ll prove you both wrong, and that’s the way it ought to be with everyone, the chance to crawl between someone’s legs, demand some loving, and get it.  Can you think of something better than that?

Come to think of it, Ribsy said, those two reminded him a lot of Barky, and the more I thought about it, I understood what he meant.

Roadkill Cafe, Part 6

Hazel had a kind of skin mask, and so privately I referred to her as Bandit (but you’ll find out another reason for that shortly). 

Hazel was a cat, and for some reason the fur around her eyes had sort of been rubbed, or perhaps scratched, away, and her personality was the classic shrinking violet.  Still, I was able to coax a moment or two of her time.  Mostly, she spent it the way she spent all her time, expecting Smokie to appear at any moment.  Smokie was another cat, and in another life they were part of the same human household, for a time.  It was decided at some point that it was more convenient to keep the one and lose the other.  Hazel was the other.

Her life had been dominated by Smokie, though, and she never seemed to forget that.  We say that animals don’t have memories, but I believe they have better memories than any human in history.  They remember only what’s important, is all.  It causes them the same kind of pain that it does us, but probably worse.  They have fewer distractions.  It’s probably why they spend their lives being distracted by what we might consider to be trivial things.  It’s the only way to survive.

Hazel was a sweetie, a darling, but it’s unlikely that she was appreciated for this when she was still with Smokie, because Smokie stole all the attention, was known to lick a face voraciously, which may be normal for some cats, but is more usually considered unusual.  That’s the kind of cat Smokie was.  Hazel was much more like the cats I knew, a lot more like Boo, but I’ll get to her shortly.

Because of Hazel, because I knew her better, Smokie became another bogeyman, like Barky, slightly less abstract, because he had a tether, one he didn’t deserve, because he was doted on to the exact degree that Hazel deserved, but couldn’t bring herself to accept, and in a weird way, it was all because of her devotion to him.  That’s what love can sometimes do. 

Truth is, Hazel took some effort to find, which is probably exactly what she’d always been like.  She hid in one of the darkest corners of the place, but I tell you she was worth the effort.  Usually, but not always, when something takes an effort, it’s worth it.  Something that’s easy can be easy to take for granted, and may not even be worth that.   

What I could never get over was that even in Smokie’s absence he dominated her, and apart from the heartache she didn’t seem to mind.  I think that made Hazel special.  The way her eyes lit up just at the thought of him, that didn’t need any considering of the missing fur.  Nothing else mattered.  They say cats can tell you a lot just from their eyes.  Hazel made it an artform.  She was the Cheshire cat of eyes.  She disappeared behind them, and the only thing she was looking at wasn’t even there.