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indecipherable Morse code
Wednesday, October 3 2001
In the middle of most nights, Noah the Cat makes several strong efforts to wake us up. There's a window near the bed whose weight is resting entirely on one corner, allowing the other corner to easily swivel back and forth a half inch or more in its frame. When it strikes the limits of its range it makes an impossible-to-ignore clunking sound, amplified by the diaphragm of the window glass. When Noah wants to wake us up, he sits in the window and bats the glass repeatedly with his paw. Clunk-clunk-clunk! Most dogs will stop doing something annoying if you tell them "no," but there's no reasoning with a cat. "Stop it dammit, Noah! No! No! Noah!" It does no good.
Clunk-clunk-clunk! It's never clear what exactly Noah wants. Food in his bowl? Water in Sally's bowl? A chance to go outside? A little trickle of water for him to slurp directly from the bathroom faucet? A tummy rub? But even if we were to attend to his needs when he makes his night clunks, we'd only be re-enforcing his annoying behavior. So yesterday Gretchen decided it was time to take a more punitive approach to the situation. She bought a powerful plastic squirt gun. If she were to smuggle this gun onto an airplane, she'd soon find herself answering questions about the trips she'd taken to the Middle East (she's been to Isræl).
Last night I was the one on the side of the bed nearest the window and it fell to me to blast Noah when he began tapping out his indecipherable Morse code message. I had to shoot him numerous times because he's protected by a thick furry coat.
Today in New York it's a perfect sunny day, the first in awhile. It's enough to make me think that maybe, despite the frailty of life and dangers to freedom, both from the good guys and bad guys, life on Earth is somehow worthwhile.
Later in the day I found myself back in the Park Slope brownstone, barefoot and seated on the floor, nursing a dumpsterdived Compaq Pentium motherboard to life. The door was open and the cats and dogs were coming and going as they chose. The air wafting in from outdoors had the wonderful nostalgic smell that warm days in the East always have when they happen in the cold season. I hadn't smelled that smell since 1998.
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