Adventures of the Damned Cat

The story begins with a splinter I had somehow got in my hand.

While my husband was upstairs reading to the children (Elizabeth Goudge's "The Secret of MoonAcre"), I was downstairs in the basement looking for a pin to poke the splinter out. The matriarch is not too crazy about Goudge's work, but she was listening anyhow and it was late. By the time, two of the children and I get home from ballet and eat, because, next to my mother-in-law, my children are also eating me out of house and home, change, watch television ("Unaccompanied Minors"), my husband tell his mother only strawberries are defrosted and available to eat but he has taken the raspberries out of the freezer and done her eye drops, it was after 11. I heard some sounds in the basement: mice, I thought.

My husband came downstairs and said his mother is looking for raspberries and that one of the children needs a pair of track pants to be washed for gymnastics for tomorrow.

"I am trying to get this splinter out, can you see it? And, do you hear that sound? Where is the cat? I think we have mice."

"I hear nothing. Where is the magnifying glass?"

Huge rustling sounds come from upstairs, banging almost. Both my husband and I look up at the basement ceiling.

"What the heck is the cat doing upstairs?" My husband goes upstairs to the kitchen because the kitchen is right above the family room-cum-library in the basement. Now, the basement is sort of a funny structure; it is u-shaped, the stairs in the centre of of the U and the rooms behind it. Our new bathroom is right beside the stairs, across from it the laundry room, then the family room; they all have finished ceilings. Our bedroom is on the other side, along with an open space that has no ceiling, but our room, but for a double entry door, is finished with a ceiling, too. Beside our unfinished door but before the stairs is a shelving unit, squished in to hold fabric boxes, ski boots and helmets, and cases. It is an unattractive unit, a 6 foot black thing that should be in the garage.

"The cat is not upstairs."

Then the meowing starts.

"Oh God, I think the cat is stuck beneath the floor boards."

I am weak in the knees. I don't want the cat to die in the floorboards and there be a smell; I am such a positive thinker. My husband is more pro-active and goes out to the garage to get a ladder. I start calling the cat. Obviously, we are making a lot of noise.

My oldest child comes down to the basement and wants to know what is going on. The meowing comes again.

"Where is the cat?"

My husband returns with the ladder and my middle child comes downstairs and says,
"Grandma wants to know what you are doing and, if you are up anyhow, are her raspberries defrosted?"

"Go back to bed. Your Dad and I will figure this out."

The meowing comes again.

"Is the cat stuck?"

The two children start calling the cat. To me, it sounds like the cat is stuck between the floor joists over the family room and I go to my bedroom wall, the one against the family room wall and try to listen to the meowing of the cat. My husband is up on the ladder by the 6 foot shelf with a flashlight calling the cat. To be honest, my husband has never been a cat person but he is completely dominated by the children and now we have the cat, there is no way he is going to let it expire stuck between the floor boards.

He tells my middle child to get the hammer because if the cat is stuck, he can punch a hole in the wall or ceiling. I don't want the cat to die either, but I am looking at my finished bedroom wall, my finished ceiling, my new bathroom and thinking, this is not going to be good.

"Should I get Grandma her raspberries?"

"I see the cat!" My oldest is over by the laundry room and furnace area, laundry room has a finished ceiling, furnace area doesn't. He's up above the furnace in floor joists, mewling his heart out. There is nothing for him to jump down on and he turns to go back into between the floor boards.

"Grab the cat!" My husband commands as he struggles to collapse the ladder by the shelf and bring it over to the furnace area. We have 8 foot ceilings in the basement and my 2 children and I look at each other with our hands up, calling the cat. Something tells me the activity is pointless; then a voice from the top of the basement stairs, calls:

"Everything okay? I was wondering if you're all still up if my raspberries are defrosted."

One of the children runs upstairs to help their Grandma get her raspberries. They are not yet defrosted but go into a bowl with a ton of sugar anyhow. My husband gets the ladder over to where the cat is peering down at us and pulls the cat, hissing and scratching, out from the ceiling. The animal is one ticked creature and tears my husband's pants as he, the cat is male, struggles to get down to me. Claws in and everything is all right with the world.

"I am going to have block access to the unfinished ceiling."

Mu husband pulls a part the 6 foot shelf and goes out into the garage to get a huge piece of cardboard with which to create a temporary wall to block access to the cat jumping into the area between the floor joists. Even though it is cardboard, he nails it in. More banging and it is now 1 o'clock in the morning.

My youngest gets up.

"What are you doing?" Siblings reveal the saga of the stuck cat. "I think he's done that before."

My husband stops the hammering and looks at his child.

"Mom, Grandma wants to know if you can make her some toast."

"Okay, everyone to bed." I take the cat upstairs to their bedrooms, tuck them back in and tell them Dad and I are going to sleep with the basement door closed and not worry about anything till the morning. My mother-in-law is made her toast and I settle her back in her room with sugared raspberries, slice of toast and cup of tea. Because I figure if you are going to have a snack at 2 o'clock in the morning, one might as well as have tea to go with it.

My husband figures he is going to have to have a completely finish the basement because we can't be letting the cat wander around between the floor joists. I can see him costing out the price of drywall and swearing under his breath as his holidays plans are eaten away by things he does not want to do.

"How is your splinter?"

I look at the palm of my hand and, in the confusion, the splinter seems to have disappeared. He checks it out with the magnifying glass and then looks at me,

"I think I am going to have something to eat."