Frida !

I generally don't like listening to stories about other people's pets because they are predictably anti-climatic. This is one of those stories. You may or may not know that Amy and I have a third member of our family in Bru, our 'smoke' Persian. Short for Brujo (which is Spanish for "Witch Doctor" and the name of a character in the Tommy Lee Jones movie 'The Missing' with smoke-colored dreadlocks), Bru is the only cat I've ever liked. First of all, I'm allergic to cat dander. Second of all, cats hide all day sleeping, and make a bunch of noise at night. Not Bru. Due to a minor medical miracle, I'm not allergic to Bru. Also, he sleeps at night like a normal person. As much as I have grown to Bru, I don't consider myself a cat person. I'm simply a Bru person.

So when Amy started her routine of selling me on getting another cat, I wasn't too excited. I am aware that two cat's keep each other company, and yes, Bru has been a little lethargic lately. But our apartment is tiny. And what if the new cat is a jerk, like Romeo, who lived with us in college and our first year out, but now lives in Mason and sleeps under the stairs all day. I didn't have a firm NO to give, so it became a reluctant Yes.

And so, last night when Amy's parents arrived from Iowa, I met our new cat for the first time. We had kicked around a few names with the front-runner being 'Zoey'. Unfortunately, our new friend doesn't look like a Zoey. She's a mix of Persian and Tabby, and the combination is awkward. So later in the evening at dinner the self-portrait of Frida Kahlo hanging on the wall behind our table sparked my fancy. All I had to do was connect the dots, or as it were, the eye brows. Our ugly cat is a Frida! Spanish, boisterous, creative, uniquely beautiful.