Backyard, 62 Theta Avenue, Daly City, CA–1960

I was yielding to the insidious, growing tendency to dwell on my advancing age, as it becomes increasingly difficult to ignore the reminders of my deteriorating appearance and function. The inevitable end was quite clear, only the timing and manner remained hidden.

It was tedious to “count one’s blessings,” rotely, as a palliative to this recurrent ennui.

This is where I was on a certain day last year, at a point where short-term tasks had been completed and the seemingly impossible long-term, not-so-vital projects were awaiting me.

There was only one thing to do: take a walk. Not a long walk on a short pier, as the saying was in Brooklyn so many years ago, but a walk in the fresh air along an arm of Stockholm’s big lake, despite the day being overcast and somewhat windy.

There was no new life to celebrate: the grasses, bushes and trees had spent their flowers, the birds were well over the nesting period and the lake’s edges were cluttered with the detritus of careless humans and the decay of the lake’s biota.

I had no direction to go in, a most unusual condition for me, so I sat on a bench facing the lake.

I brought no book nor writing material. I needed to be open to the fates, unprepared for evaluating and rationalizing.

A neighborhood cat wandered by–a sleek gray one. It looked briefly at me, sniffed a few plants, then gracefully jumped onto the bench. It sat near me, giving itself a few licks and scratches as it faced the sun with me. I remained passive but observant.

It stretched a wonderful cat stretch, then walked the few cat steps between us, slowly and confidently, and sat in my lap. I am no stranger to cats; I immediately assumed the role required of me. I petted and stroked and scratched the cat exactly where and how he or she needed. We bonded for a short but timeless period.

The warmth and the feel of the cat were familiar to me. Visions of my youth, when I lived with cats, flowed over and through me. I remembered my parents and sister, especially, and then my children and a former mate. These memories morphed into others, just as a dream progresses. I felt as if I carried a great museum of memories inside me, but it didn’t seem as burdensome as it sometimes does.

Perhaps I dozed a bit.

The cat eventually had enough of what I was offering, unwound itself from my lap, walked over the bench a short way and dropped to the ground without a backward glance. The communion was over.

I went to the supermarket to shop for groceries, then back home to do some household chores.

the weight of one’s world
can easily dissipate
with help from a cat