Sometimes I can forget that I see through my own very limited viewpoint. I'm sure this has happened to at least one other person, as the following tale will show. It reminds me that by getting the viewpoints of others, it is possible to make more sense out of life.
When I long-ago moved from Vermont to Alabama, I brought a young boy-cat with me. His name was Rory Duncan Kilpatrick MacDuff, and he was of the true Irish pugnacious temperament, ready for a brawl, ready for the ladies. He and I shared the ride in my tiny Datsun B-210, which had all the space of a tuna can with windows, and was filled to capacity with us and our essentials. In case you haven't heard, a ride in a car is an affront to the dignity of a cat, and such was made known to me for over one thousand miles. That fine feline gentleman probably wouldn't have minded quite as much, but it was crowded enough in the car that I regularly grabbed his head instead of the stick shift, and attempted to place him into fourth gear.
Upon arrival at my new job in Birmingham, I discovered the pay was what is charitably called "starting pay." In case you have never experienced "starting pay" in the movie theatres, this is an amount sufficient for 1/3 of the normal rent in the area, and two meals a day, with the third meal consisting of popcorn when the popcorn machine is cleaned at the end of the night.
Anyway, since money was tight, I had to find and share an apartment with two room-mates. I was fortunate and hooked up with two other young men in similar financial straits while they went to college. The apartment was a third floor walk-up of questionable construction, but it was clean and did have three bedrooms and a decent bathroom and kitchen.
Rory Duncan Kilpatrick MacDuff was not a problem as far as the two college students were concerned, so with him looking on in disbelief, I told the fellows that he was an indoor cat, and should not be let out of the apartment. Both agreed, and I went off to work for my first day.
When I arrived back from work that evening, Rory Duncan Kilpatrick MacDuff was waiting for me outside near the foot of the stairs, asking when dinner was going to be served and what was on the menu. I brought him upstairs and back into the apartment, checked with the roomies, but they denied ever putting the cat out. I was dubious as to whether the whole truth was being presented, but because they had that laid-back attitude that only students going to an easy college and smelling slightly of grass have, I believed them. Or should I say that if there was a problem, it was an accident and they weren't remembering too clearly. Rory Duncan Kilpatrick MacDuff kept noticeably silent on the entire matter.
On my second day of work, when I arrived at the apartment, Rory Duncan Kilpatrick MacDuff was again waiting for me outside near the foot of the stairs, asking when dinner was going to be served and berating me for my late arrival time. I brought him upstairs and back into the apartment, and on the following morning checked again with the roomies, who both again denied ever putting the cat out.
This went on for another two days, and had it not been for the laid-back attitudes we all expressed, there would have been the potential for roommate wars.
On the fifth day, one of them came up to me when I woke up, and proudly informed me that they had figured out, just like Sherlock Holmes, how Rory Duncan Kilpatrick MacDuff was performing his Houdini act. My gentleman cat had explored under the kitchen sink, found a large hole in the cabinet where the sewer pipe exited, crawled in, and then exited through a similar hole in the undersink area of the apartment next door.
I mentioned about the importance of not taking a limited viewpoint. The resident in the next apartment had at first been in his living room, looked up from his television, and found an Irish cat swaggering towards him, intent upon his easy chair. The befuddled man had absolutely no idea where a cat came from, or who was mysteriously letting this particularly Irish feline into his home, and promptly tossed him outside.
Rory Duncan Kilpatrick MacDuff was grateful to the man for allowing him outside all the time, even if the method of his airing was uncouth, and had one of my room-mates not been at our apartment door when the cat was thrown out next door, would have continued the game.
Things are not always what they seem, so if your room-mate denies letting the cat out, it pays to be a little laid-back and trust that the answer to such mysteries will eventually become known.
