A Unified Theory of Cats on the Internet by E.J. White

Author:E.J. White
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Stanford University Press
Published: 2020-11-15T00:00:00+00:00

EPILOGUE

Late Adopter

When I started work on this book, I was Not a Cat Person. But I try to be thorough, so once research was underway, I reached out to a shelter in Brooklyn and asked to foster a kitten.

The shelter chose a small black kitten. I put him in my apartment’s bathroom, at first, so that he couldn’t hide where I couldn’t find him. When I started to pet him, an immense purr rose and filled the little room, vibrating off the walls. I felt like I was using echolocation. Aaron Purr, I thought, and that was that.

“You know what the problem is?” My father asked that day by phone.

“What?” I asked.

“You’re going to keep the cat.”

“I’m not,” I said, and explained why for the next ten minutes.

As the days passed, I posted updates on Facebook:

Dog and kitten are curled up together.

Now Victor is imitating the cat. Cat does something, Victor tries to do it.

More imitation: cat grooms cat; Victor tries to groom cat.

Dog and cat are cuddled up again. I don’t want to breathlessly live-blog this relationship, but here we are.

Kitten’s favorite place to nap is on the desk by my computer. I guess this is okay for the time being.

The cat has earned my respect. But that doesn’t mean my loyalties have changed.

Finally, I told my father on the phone, “I’m going to keep the cat.”

“Surprise, surprise,” he said.

Aaron Purr will never be a Twitter star or an Instagram glamour-puss. He hates having his picture taken and stalks away if I bring a camera near him. If I may project human traits onto him, he is deliberate, reserved, and thoughtful.

It’s humbling to like a cat after spending so much energy complaining about them. I’ll go further and say, since Victor can’t read, that I’m probably a cat person. I foster kittens regularly these days, and they are very much present as characters in the home: goofy, gentlemanly, shy, sly, imperious; amusing companions during solitary work. I’ve learned more about how to read feline body language, and it turns out that cats are full of emotion.

Having been reminded so pointedly that I can’t predict the turns in my own life, I should refrain, I think, from pretending that I can say much about the future of the internet. Yet we can likely be confident that whatever turns the internet takes, the tubes will remain cat-shaped: frivolous, subversive, cute, mean, and weird, with communities of users fighting endless battles over the imaginary heart of the web, and with play and politics in perpetual mutual reinforcement.

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