Something magical

A little ode to Our Bruce

In honour of The Spinoff’s Pet Week I thought I would share my little pet story. I hope you enjoy it.

I’ll tell you something I’m not very proud of about myself. Here’s the truth: I rolled my eyes a little (a lot) when I found out the cat rescue place I was going to did not allow humans to pick their kittens.

I wanted a black kitten. It had been my dream forever to have a black kitten. Witches had black cats. I loved the mystery of them.

I’d had my last cat for 16 years. I loved him dearly but I hadn’t picked him. The dog had just brought him home one day and boom we had a ginger kitten called Borro. It was a forced adoption and my husband wasn’t happy.

Eventually my husband fell head over heels for our Ginger Tom who acted like a dog and would claw at me whenever I walked past.

He was my husband’s cat, my children’s cat, a dog cat, a wild cat. But we all adored him anyway.

Still, I was looking forward to choosing my cat. My plan was simple. I knew the process at Feral Nation was to go into the room with the kittens and then ‘get to know them’. The kitten would choose the owner.

There was a bundle of happy kittens and I noticed the black kitten straight away. I picked it up and immediately said “Oh! This one loves you!” to my kids.

The black kitten hissed and leapt from my hands as my youngest son clung to me. I followed the black kitten. My eldest son sat on the bed, overwhelmed by kittens. “Can we have all of them?” he asked.

Since I had not told my husband we were getting a cat, and since my husband had said “we are not getting a cat” for the last six months, I said no.

I made a beeline for the black kitten.

Then I heard it.

My little boy humming. When he’s especially happy, especially at peace, especially comforted, he hums. When he was little we were alarmed by the humming and the fact that he didn’t speak. We didn’t know then that there’s so many ways of saying I love you.

I looked at my little boy in the corner of the room. A brindle bundle in his arms. He beamed at me, humming.

No black cat for me.

My eldest bent down to pat the little kitten’s tiny wee head. It licked his finger and he erupted in joy and delight.

“Looks like your kitten has chosen your family,” the lovely rescue owner said.

No black cat for me.

The cat was christened Bruce Sunshine Daffodil on the way home. Bruce after Bruce Dickinson, Sunshine Daffodil for God Knows What.

To say he settled in quickly would be an understatement. My youngest son barely put him down in the first week we had him. He was carried everywhere and never once scratched or hissed. Even when he was brought into the shower (before I explained cats do not generally like showers). I started to wonder if there was something wrong with him. My sweet Old Borro had hated the children.

Each night the children fought over who would get to take Bruce to bed. On his own Bruce decided to check on both anyway. He would squeeze out of my youngest son’s death grip once he’d fallen asleep and wander into my eldest son’s room for a cuddle before returning.

He waited patiently for the boys to come home from school and never even squeaked when he was immediately scooped up and pushed into a pram to play ‘families’. Bruce willingly chose to sit between the boys as they watched YouTube videos that were basically just two grown men screaming DUDE, YEET, and WATTERTHOSE over and over again.

To be honest Bruce confused me. At one point I thought maybe there was something wrong with him. Surely no cat is that patient or that tolerant.

My youngest son told us once that his brain felt like it had a thousand hands and that every hand grabs a thought and every thought sits in his brain and his brain is so full of thoughts that it hurts. Some days are better than others but the hands torment my little boy.

And in those moments when I see him, covering his ears, and beginning to rock to steady himself, I’m no longer the first one to get to him to help him feel safe. It is Bruce.

Bruce somehow knows. He rubs his face against my little one’s cheek as if to cast a little spell. When his hands frantically make shapes in the air, Bruce settles beneath them, a comfort if needed. When he is overwhelmed, when he cries out because all the noise is just too much, Bruce purrs in his ear and he quiets to hear his favourite sound of all.

When routines are out the window because of this pandemic life, when nothing feels right, when everything is The Wrong Way, Bruce is a constant in my little one’s life. Bruce reminds him that while he likes things to be the same every time, that can’t always be. But Bruce will always be Bruce. And Bruce will always be there.

Bruce wrestles the thousand hands and stills them. Bruce helps his wonderful, exhausting brain to rest.

He loves without judgement. Our boy is never too loud for him, too much for him, too fast for him.

Bruce is teaching him what true friendship is. What true love is.*

I have no doubt that Bruce chose our family. That animals are meant to choose their families.

I wanted a mysterious cat.

And I got one.

Because Bruce performs miracles every day. As tiny as his little paws, but I see them. I see the way he has brought a kind of magic into our lives. He has bewitched us.

I am so glad he chose us.

*I read this to my boy before publishing since it shares a little bit about him and he said he liked it a lot and I should say that while Bruce is teaching him friendship and love, he is teaching Bruce how to use a cat door.