A kind of interdependence

On Halloween of last year I brought home Minksy, our five-year old black cat who has two white toes. 

She was adopted via a local charity that re-homes cats, and though I genuinely wanted a cat and was in a position to provide a good home for one, her adoption had something of an ulterior motive. 

You see, I had taken ownership of a Victorian garden flat in May, and for the next few months, found myself facing a vexing flea infestation from what I can only assume was the prior owner’s three pets and apparent obliviousness. This may sound like a situation where you call up an exterminator, pay £250, wait a couple weeks, and your problem is solved—especially if you live in a flat with neither pets nor carpet. It was nowhere near that simple.

It’s a very long story, one that I will spare you, except for saying that the toll this particular episode took on my mental health was hugely destabilizing, and its magnitude took me by surprise after all the work I’ve done on myself. For months, I found it basically impossible to regulate my nervous system, a fact that felt somewhat shameful to me, and one I couldn’t share with others at the time.

Adopting a cat after struggling to tamp down a flea infestation may seem like a strange choice. But I reasoned if she was treated with the strongest preventative medication a vet would prescribe, it would, if anything, help control the problem in the future. I also really wanted a cat. So I rode the bus to the house of a nice lady who runs a feline foster home. As I followed her into her improvised cattery, she paused to turn around and say, “I think I know which one you’re going to like.”

Seconds later, as if she had been briefed in advance, Minksy (née Gracie) sidled right up to me, purring like a chainsaw. She stood out as the most charming and vivacious cat out of a bunch of sad misfits. She boasted a velvety coat that looked like something a rich lady might buy at Saks Fifth Avenue. I looked at her searchingly, trying to ascertain if she thought this whole thing was a good idea. She confidently beamed right back: “Yes it is. Please take me home now.” 

A week or two of Minksy and a couple of trips to the vet later, the flea problem faded into memory. Soon, I completely forgot that I had adopted a cat to help mitigate the fallout of a domestic trauma. Instead, she became the most consistent source of joy in my life, day after day. 

Though I grew up with and loved all manner of pets, in the decade and a half since I left my parents’ home, I truly forgot what it was like to live alongside an animal. What I’ve realized since is that animals basically are nervous systems. They don’t tell themselves stories about what is or could be; instead, they are entirely led by whether or not they feel safe in an embodied sense, right in this very moment. The same goes for small babies. I think to a certain extent, plants are like this too.

These beings are attempting to communicate with us in highly sophisticated ways, ways that many of us have lost the ability to hear as a result of our highly verbal, data-obsessed, and intellectualized lives. We are moving through the world led by our broken and over-worked brains. They are led by a much more sophisticated, intuitive, and holistic compass.

Minksy is the model of an embodied life well lived. She rests when she needs to, which is most hours of the day; she plays and moves with great intensity, grace, and curiosity; she has incredibly strong boundaries when you piss her off; and she eats her food in a slow, methodical way, as if to eke out maximum pleasure. She enters and leaves our flat entirely of her own volition, she tries to groom the top of my head when I feel sad or depressed, and she provides affection in a way that is endlessly giving but also demanding of mutual respect.  

Having a third nervous system in my home—one that is incredibly adept at switching from maximum chill to maximum alertness, and back again with ease—makes me especially aware of the ways I have not mastered that. I find it quite humbling. 

In my pre-Covid life, I remember thinking I was way too busy to have a pet. It seemed like it would be more hassle than anything else. I’d have to buy more stuff and book more appointments and keep track of more things. Plus, what would I do when I traveled? It’d just be another thing to add to—and then strike off—the already-too-long list. No thanks.

But what I didn’t know was what living with an animal would provide me in return. After all, humans have lived alongside animals for eons—and definitely dealt with fleas that entire time, probably with far more grace than I managed. What I was assuming would be just more draining responsibility was actually a kind of interdependence I didn’t know I my life was missing. An embodied, non-verbal, and intuitive relationship that all living things are capable of having with one another—as long as we humans stop convincing ourselves we’re somehow smarter than the rest.

I read somewhere recently that it’s one of life’s greatest honors to be in sustained friendship with an animal. I couldn’t agree more, and I’d add it’s one of life’s greatest sources of wisdom, too.

Things I enjoyed reading

• A fascinating read on the complexity and prickliness of adult friendships, a topic that is woefully under-explored. [The Atlantic]

• It feels refreshing and unusual to read something that generously explains a beautiful and useful aspect of another culture, and then invites you to use it in your own life. [NYT]

• On how the “fandomification of global conflict” is turning many of us into “emotional trauma gig workers.” [Garbage Day]

• An edifying and convincing take on how to think about becoming a parent in the midst of a climate emergency. (Scroll down past the introduction to find the letter.) [HotHouse]

• “To be or feel seen doesn’t need to happen, every time we read.” A familiar-sounding reflection on how it feels to write online these days. [Alicia Kennedy]

• If you feel deeply hopeless about the state of the world, I really recommend growing things. It will help you remember how things are supposed to work. It’s so much easier than you think (start with containers!) and now is a perfect time of year to start. [Guardian]

Things I enjoyed listening to

• I think it’s easy to see why Janet Lansbury’s parenting advice is so popular. What’s even more interesting though is thinking about how her advice can be applied not to kids, but the other adults in our lives, even strangers. [The Ezra Klein Show]

• “Isn’t there a point at which hope becomes just another kind of avoidance?” On “millennial despair” as a genre of writing and art. [The New Yorker Radio Hour]

• I’ve been enjoying the Offline podcast hosted by Jon Favreau, which asks smart, online people about their fraying relationship to the internet. Chimamanda Adichie talks about the loss of good faith online and Elizabeth Bruenig on what we lose when we can’t find forgiveness for other people. [Offline podcast]

Paid newsletter interlude

There are a lot of new subscribers this month because I tweeted about journalism’s diminishing career paths and lots of disillusioned media people agreed with me. It’s never a good idea to wade into trending Twitter discourse, but nevertheless, I’m glad you’re all here as a result.

This newsletter has a paid version in which I interview people about how to live a meaningful life amidst climate chaos, a ever-worsening news cycle, and the general thrum of despair. The question I’m always trying to find answers to is: “How am I supposed to live now?” Here are some of my (un-paywalled) favorites to give you a taste. I would love it if you considered subscribing.

• Aboriginal scholar Tyson Yunkaporta on building “cultures of transition”

• Author Katherine May on living cyclically rather than linearly

• Psychologist Margaret Klein Salamon on self help for facing the climate emergency
  

Word soup

“The role of the writer is not to change the world, but to speak about things differently and thus make them more visible.” —Iulian Ciocan

“Late winter is where we make the choice to start again. Here, we commit to the volition of our existence, for another try. Life is asking: Having been through the loss and the heartbreak, would you stay in the dark or take another crack at light? Would you rise, knowing what you know now: Would you do it all again?” –@pokeacupuncture

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