The People I Met (or The Cat That Lived in a Pillowcase)

The people I met when I owned the Hungry Moon diner could fill a book, and one day they may, but for now I offer you bits and pieces of my life in Stamford, NY. Because I didn’t know anyone when I moved to Stamford, I made friends with many of my customers. There was my friend Bonnie who invited me into her circle of friends, and hosted the monthly book group she asked me to join. My good friends Pat and John, and their daughters, now grown, and still close friends. I met artists and writers and lots of people I never would have had access to in NYC, but in upstate New York I met them at parties, and friends’ houses. Society in a small town was different from what I’d known anywhere else I’d lived.

MK and Jackson were people I met separately at the diner and it was a while before I knew they were married. Jackson was a photographer and would stop in and sit at the counter and talk to me. He was intense and bookish, a true intellectual, and I found him fascinating. MK worked for the school district and was bubbly and warm. She would come in with co-workers for lunch, and always knew everyone in the place, and had time to chat with all of them.

One winter evening they invited me to a small dinner party they were hosting. Their directions included turning right when I saw the yellow school bus parked at the top of their  driveway. They had a sweet little house, with a circular fireplace in the center of the living room. After dinner we were sitting around the fireplace talking when there was a tapping at the sliding glass door. MK jumped up to let a cat in who crawled into a waiting pillowcase, then she tied the top closed with some twine, scooped up the bundle and laid it/him near the fireplace. The cat settled himself and seemed to go to sleep. No one else said a word, but I had to ask what the story was with the cat in the pillowcase.

They explained that Jackson was allergic to cats, but by keeping the cat in the pillowcase he didn’t suffer from them. The cat was a stray they had taken in when he was a kitten, and this was his life; when he was inside he lived in the pillowcase. When he wanted to move around he’d go out. I’ve had cats most of my life and, I  don’t think any of them would have been happy with this arrangement. In my experience most cats want freedom, even if they don’t ‘ get to go  outside, they like to roam. It seemed that this cat had traded that freedom for regular meals, and a cozy spot near the fire during the long, cold winters. I understood that cat better than I would have admitted to myself back then. I think we all end up living in pillowcases once in a while.

MK and Jackson loved that cat in their own strange ways. A few years after I moved away I heard that they had divorced which made me sad, and I wondered what became of the cat. I like to think MK kept him and he was freed from life in a pillowcase, unless he was so used to it, he couldn’t adjust to being free.