Cats for bookends
Created | Updated Jun 10, 2005
Sunday morning. Sunlight filtering through the curtains and flooding the bedroom with warm pale green light. It is not unpleasant - a bit like being in a fishbowl.
Enjoying that delicious languid half-sleep - not quite fast asleep but certainly not awake. The alarm is switched off so I have the luxury of turning over and dozing off again. Indulge in a big lazy stretch and cause husband to grumble 'sotto voce' at me.
Door bangs. Teenage son going out to take Jake Woof for an early walk, while Jake's owners, Mr. and Mrs. Woof, (yes, really!) are away on holiday.
A sudden patter of feet, a moment's silence and then a soft thump on my legs. The cats have seized their chance to sneak stealthily through the open porch door and gain the inner sanctum of our bedroom. First thump swiftly followed by second thump.
I can feel paws treading my legs carefully as one of the cats picks its way across the quilt. After a couple of minutes, it decides on a suitable spot and curls up, heavy and warm against my hip. The other cat clambers its way across both supine bodies and nestles into a spot beside my husband.
Drowsing, not quite awake, I comment that the cats are like bookends which makes us the books. Husband agrees. He's not really asleep. If we are books, I wonder, then what sort of books are we?
After giving it a few moment's thought, I decide that husband really should be a do-it-yourself book since he's a wonderful handyman around the house. Perhaps he's the human incarnation of the Reader's Digest Repair Manual up on our bookshelf? I inform him of this. He grunts dozily. I tell him that he is brown with a hessian-covered spine.
For some reason he finds this funny and the bed shakes with laughter. Cat lifts its head to scowl at him then tucks its nose back under its paw. He says he would rather be leather-bound! I smother a giggle at the throaty chuckle accompanying this rather suggestive statement.
He soon gets his own back. I am, he tells me, a Thesaurus! How can I be anything else when I am so full of words and picky about grammar? I feel vaguely indignant. This causes him further amusement which breaks out into a hoot of laughter as he turns over and catches sight of my face. I'm always writing and reading, he points out. Perhaps I could even be a learned textbook? He has the cheek to claim that he has to drag me away from the computer sometimes! I shake him hard and protest indignantly.
What about teenage son? I wonder aloud. There is a moment's silence then "Comic!" we both howl in unison and collapse with mirth. The bed shakes and squeaks. Cats meow in protest. A comic is the obvious choice. Brightly-coloured (he loves red), full of fantasies about valiant heroes winning the day against insurmountable odds, women with anatomically-impossible figures and lots of action pictures (he's not the world's greatest reader...).
Lastly our daughter. Being autistic, she is often extremely difficult to comprehend. Probably a long-lost text written in Latin or Sanskrit? I suggest. Husband isn't so sure. More like a picture-book with no words, he reckons. OK, so how about a long-lost Sanskrit picture-book with no words? I compromise.
In the strange way that surreal shared jokes tend to do, my comment cracks us up totally and we roar with laughter. Cats flee simultaneously from the shaking bed, the patter of their feet receding down the corridor.
Teenage son returns from walking Jake and wonders what on earth is causing his parents so much hilarity at such an early hour on a Sunday morning. We don't dare tell him, but stifle snorts of laughter when he kindly brings us tea in bed. He gives us a pitying look and retreats to his bedroom - probably to read his latest Marvel comic, I shouldn't wonder........
So, think about it, if you were a book what sort would you be?
Enjoying that delicious languid half-sleep - not quite fast asleep but certainly not awake. The alarm is switched off so I have the luxury of turning over and dozing off again. Indulge in a big lazy stretch and cause husband to grumble 'sotto voce' at me.
Door bangs. Teenage son going out to take Jake Woof for an early walk, while Jake's owners, Mr. and Mrs. Woof, (yes, really!) are away on holiday.
A sudden patter of feet, a moment's silence and then a soft thump on my legs. The cats have seized their chance to sneak stealthily through the open porch door and gain the inner sanctum of our bedroom. First thump swiftly followed by second thump.
I can feel paws treading my legs carefully as one of the cats picks its way across the quilt. After a couple of minutes, it decides on a suitable spot and curls up, heavy and warm against my hip. The other cat clambers its way across both supine bodies and nestles into a spot beside my husband.
Drowsing, not quite awake, I comment that the cats are like bookends which makes us the books. Husband agrees. He's not really asleep. If we are books, I wonder, then what sort of books are we?
After giving it a few moment's thought, I decide that husband really should be a do-it-yourself book since he's a wonderful handyman around the house. Perhaps he's the human incarnation of the Reader's Digest Repair Manual up on our bookshelf? I inform him of this. He grunts dozily. I tell him that he is brown with a hessian-covered spine.
For some reason he finds this funny and the bed shakes with laughter. Cat lifts its head to scowl at him then tucks its nose back under its paw. He says he would rather be leather-bound! I smother a giggle at the throaty chuckle accompanying this rather suggestive statement.
He soon gets his own back. I am, he tells me, a Thesaurus! How can I be anything else when I am so full of words and picky about grammar? I feel vaguely indignant. This causes him further amusement which breaks out into a hoot of laughter as he turns over and catches sight of my face. I'm always writing and reading, he points out. Perhaps I could even be a learned textbook? He has the cheek to claim that he has to drag me away from the computer sometimes! I shake him hard and protest indignantly.
What about teenage son? I wonder aloud. There is a moment's silence then "Comic!" we both howl in unison and collapse with mirth. The bed shakes and squeaks. Cats meow in protest. A comic is the obvious choice. Brightly-coloured (he loves red), full of fantasies about valiant heroes winning the day against insurmountable odds, women with anatomically-impossible figures and lots of action pictures (he's not the world's greatest reader...).
Lastly our daughter. Being autistic, she is often extremely difficult to comprehend. Probably a long-lost text written in Latin or Sanskrit? I suggest. Husband isn't so sure. More like a picture-book with no words, he reckons. OK, so how about a long-lost Sanskrit picture-book with no words? I compromise.
In the strange way that surreal shared jokes tend to do, my comment cracks us up totally and we roar with laughter. Cats flee simultaneously from the shaking bed, the patter of their feet receding down the corridor.
Teenage son returns from walking Jake and wonders what on earth is causing his parents so much hilarity at such an early hour on a Sunday morning. We don't dare tell him, but stifle snorts of laughter when he kindly brings us tea in bed. He gives us a pitying look and retreats to his bedroom - probably to read his latest Marvel comic, I shouldn't wonder........
So, think about it, if you were a book what sort would you be?
