Under the Paw of the Catfather

You know that rare, magical feeling when everything in life goes exactly the way it’s supposed to? The pieces line up, the plan works, and you think, finally, the universe is on my side.  Yeah, this is not one of those stories.

When I brought home my second cat, Walter, in February, I assumed nothing much would change.  Sure, everyone said cats hate newcomers, but I figured they were exaggerating or just lacked my natural zen. Ha!  I expected a little hissing, some territorial drama with my OG cat, Jasper, and then Stepford-adjacent harmony.  I had raised two well-behaved cats before: my timeline, my rules, my flawless little system would work perfectly.  Follow the shelter’s foolproof instructions, and the cats would obviously fall in line.  How hard could it possibly be?

The universe, of course, laughed.

What followed wasn’t a Full House family reunion but my own personal Red Wedding.  One moment calm, the next sphinx-shaped shadows struck from the dark, vases detonated like wine bombs, and every weak limb was fair game.  Even the sofa cushions weren’t spared, clawed with the kind of spite that would make a Lannister proud.

Eventually, the chaos simmered down.  Tails relaxed, and for a hot second, I thought peace had arrived.  I should’ve known better.  Peace with cats is like a vampire with an umbrella: a false sense of safety that burns out by sunrise.  Walter’s grand finale?  Declaring my shower his personal bathroom.  And when I blocked that off, because boundaries, of course, he doubled down and used the floor right next to the litter box just to make a point.  Message received.  That smug, adorable little bastard.

Cats are supposed to be litter box savants.  In ancient Egypt, they weren’t just pets, they were gods with whiskers.  I like to picture them turning desert sand into sacred bathrooms, pyramid-shaped offerings to themselves.  No archeological proof, of course, just my theory.  Fast-forward to today, and their shrines have been downgraded to plastic bins in laundry rooms, offerings of clumping clay and Ocean Mist air freshener.  The gods may have fallen, but the law still holds: see box, use box. That’s it. That’s the job description.

Which is why I’d only ever heard whispers about the nightmare cats.  The ones who ruin carpets, shoes (sorry, Ashley), and their owners’ sanity.  So when Walter staged his rebellion, I panicked.  This was not the tidy plan I’d drawn up in my head.  My grip slipped, and mutiny ensued.

I spent $700 on a self-cleaning litter box, and Walter still looked me dead in the eye and chose the shower instead.  Maybe I’m the asshole who financed a cat toilet, but the disrespect was palpable.  For the record, the Litter-Robot works great.  Walter just prefers desecrating the one place I thought was mine.

At first, I did what I always do with problems I don’t want to face: denial.  Maybe it was a phase. Maybe if I ignored it, it would stop.  You already know how that story ends.

Turns out I’d unknowingly changed his litter six weeks earlier, swapping in some so-called “upgrade,” same brand, just with a probiotic for odor (whatever that means).  Miraculously, the smell disappeared.  Walter, however, was not impressed.  So I switched it back, thinking I’d restored balance to his fragile little ecosystem.  Problem solved…for about 48 hours.  Then Walter looked at me like the fool I was and said, “Cute try, you sneaky little trumpet.”

Six months ago, he was homeless in a hoarding situation.  Now he’s a connoisseur of organic litter.  Can’t imagine where he picked that up.

Of course, I couldn’t help comparing him to Jasper.  Jasper is perfect.  She’s an angel and has never caused me a single issue.  Walter, on the other hand, was throwing a wrench into my carefully constructed routine.  The litter box trials felt less like pet care and more like a meth lab, all the precision with none of the profits.  Which feels fitting, given his namesake.

And here’s where it got weird.  Assuming you’re still with me after 800 words on feline bathroom politics, it wasn’t just frustrating, I felt personally called out.  There was a pressure under my ribs, like something waiting to explode.  Why isn’t this working?  I’d done everything right.  That’s when it hit me: this wasn’t about Walter at all.

I keep trying to run life like a controlled burn.  But the litter box taught me that chaos doesn’t stay where you put it.  The more I try to trap the mess, the faster it scratches its way out.  Sometimes the only way through is to loosen my grip and actually pay attention, whether it’s to another person or, apparently, a very opinionated feline.

This is how I move through the rest of my life too.  When I can’t control the big outcomes, I fixate on the little choices.  I’m not a type A perfectionist, I’m a type “spiral until it feels right” perfectionist.  I’m messy, flexible, allergic to rigidity.  But somehow, I still expect everything to unfold exactly the way I pictured it in my head.  It only took one cat with bathroom preferences to call me out. The litter box was never just a litter box.  It was the metaphor crouching in the corner, waiting to pounce…