Late at night a few years ago I walked home from a friend's downtown apartment. We had discussed a variety of subjects, drunk enough beers to feel buzzed, listened to The Doors on compact disc--not quite as good as listening to them the vinyl way, but adequate to add weirdness to the living room's ambiance.
A little tweaked emotionally by the content of our conversation (one involving aliens, government surveillance, the paintings of Hieronymus Bosch, and disappointments in our dealings with women), I walked faster and faster on Main Street, wanting badly to be in my own space. It was around three in the morning. The only activity consisted of traffic lights flashing yellow before and behind me. Empty cars parked here and there. Muted light from streetlamps brightening the sidewalk at intervals, and a breeze rattling an empty soda bottle.
As spooky as the main drag setting was, I stayed with it until the quiet perpendicular avenue that would lead me to my street. One car, driven by a civilian, passed by--no cops. Every upstairs window on Main Street was dark. Some of these are parts of apartments, but I guess everyone was asleep, or awake in the dark.
I approached the last intersection with traffic lights before my turnoff. I started across and stopped, seeing something across the intersection, near the opposite corner: a white cat, sitting placidly, front legs straight, looking at me. I kept moving, but slowed down quite a bit as I crossed to the other side. Wind blew a piece of paper between me and the cat. I walked on and before I reached my turnoff I looked back. The cat was still there, sitting on the street just off the curb.
I thought about the cat the rest of the walk home. I tried to assign some meaning to the encounter, but came up with nothing. I couldn't make it into an omen. The image of that night's cat sits in my memory, doing nothing, meaning nothing, a moment shared; forgotten, probably, by the cat.
Vic Neptune
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