someday things will be ok

I got really sick while house-sitting for my mom last winter. My nose and ears sealed up completely, my chest was congested, my throat cracked, my eyes swelled up and I couldn’t really sleep because my airways kept closing the second I’d lie down. I’d just lie on the couch on a mound of pillows and periodically fall in and out of a daze.

After about three days of this, I snapped alert all of a sudden in the wee hours of morning, choking, unable to inflate my lungs all the way.

My mom’s asshole cat was huddled down on all fours smack in the middle of my chest, looking horrifically uncomfortable with the situation, PURRING and PURRING like a damn chainsaw.

He cracked an eye to glare at me when I moved to pet him. This doesn’t make us friends, he said.

“Good kitty,” I croaked, rubbing his cheek with one finger. “Nice kitty. Good boy.”

You stink, he said. You disgust me.

Then he brushed off my finger, shut his eye, hunkered tighter, and kept purring. I fell asleep. I don’t know exactly how long he was there, but it was at least a solid hour.

gorilla brain: hit something

chimpanzee brain: scream

4am on the Icefields Parkway in Jasper National Park