Elegy for a Kitten

I was on my way to the store the other day when I saw the carcass of a dead cat frozen stiff by the side of the road. I immediately thought of my ex-wife. Then I started wondering how I made that connection. So I retraced my train of thought (which isn't easy): some of the tracks don't line up quite right, the transformer is a little quirky, one of the boxcars is missing a wheel and I haven't been able to find my engine in years.

Anyway... I was on my way to the store to see if I could find some left-over Valentine's candy. I figured the stores probably over-estimated how many men would try buying their way out of trouble with a cheap box of chocolate. I just hoped I could get there before all of the fat chicks cleaned it out.

In case you haven't figured it out - I have always been a hopeless romantic. So I have to admit that the irony of my divorce coming so close to Valentine's Day is not lost on me. But the divorce is FINAL and, as a result, I feel I have learned some valuable lessons:

One, is that if divorce wasn't so expensive and difficult, women probably wouldn't want one.
Two, is the reason divorce is so expensive is that it is worth it.
And three, is that divorce is probably the last time you can completely satisfy your wife.


It also let's you finally see your partner without those rose colored glasses.

petty
adjective
1 petty regulations: TRIVIAL, trifling, minor, small, unimportant, insignificant, inconsequential, inconsiderable, negligible, paltry, footling, pettifogging; informal piffling, piddling, fiddling. ANTONYMS important, serious.
2 a petty form of revenge:SMALL-MINDED, mean, ungenerous, shabby, spiteful. ANTONYMS magnanimous.

Since it took two years after the separation for her to agree to the details of the divorce, I'm thinking #2 is the one I'm looking for. Oddly enough, the process also smells like number two.







Divorce also makes you aware of how people change. I remember, when we were young, how she used to be my playful little Kitten . That was my pet name for her. Kitten. Years later, after the kids were grown and my health and earning capacities were failing me, she wasn't so much "playful" as she was "playing me". And I came to realize that the cat that the kitten became had the morals of an alley cat. Not long after that she turned feral.


In the end, now that she has her own place, she has at least one cat that I know of and is probably well on her way towards becoming a crazy cat lady.




Did I mention that I am allergic to cats? I could go on but I don't want to be accused of beating a dead pussy.

But all of this does help explain how, in the constant conversation between the voices in my head, one of them could say, "Speaking of a dead pussy... have I ever told you about my ex-wife?"

.