THE OTHER BABY IN OUR FAMILY

We have a cat named Ari or, more formally, Ari Flufenstein (he's Jewish....we, however, are not). Before we had Rya, I had been known to pepper my conversations with wild stories about my crazy cat. He has more personality than most dogs I know and definitely most cats I've come across. As evidence of this, we caught him in the action here airing out his private bits on top of the humidifier like Marilyn Monroe on a breezy street grate. Needless to say, its been quite an adjustment for him not being the center of attention with the new 'animal' in the house. I am sure his internal dialogue is filled with such jealousy-laced statements as, "Will this THING ever SHUT UP?" or "Why is the new cat allowed to get on the table and I am not." and "Oh NO YOU DIDN'T just walk past me when I am lying on my back, all cute like with my belly exposed to be petted."

As most astute cats do, he has dedicated the first 3 years of his life to finding out the small things that REALLY piss us off and repeating those activities as some sort of retribution for the unknown wrongdoings that we have subjected him too that day (like running full speed across our heads at 4 in the morning as a nice subtle wake up call to feed him a late night snack). Rya has added a whole new dimension to this past time for him. He has now discovered that when she sleeps we really LOVE it when he gets as close to her as he can and meow/cries at the top of his tiny kitty lungs to get our attention. That might not sound too bad, some would say that it could even be coincidental actually - but I have evidence to the contrary.

The second month into our baby adventure, I had wrangled the beast into submission and placed her in her crib. We were still holding a 24 hour vigil by her bedside at this time (carried over from her breathing issues in the hospital and fueled by the neuroses of new parenthood) and I was laying on the floor of her room. After a fruitless 15 minute tirade of running feverishly through the house meowing and knocking into everything in his path - Ari decided to take a more 'personal' approach to getting my attention. He saunters into Rya's room, swishing his giant fluffy tail in my face to make sure his presence is known, walks directly up to the crib, props his paws up to peer in at her and proceeds to turn and look at me while he reaches his paw in and bats softly at her FACE. Seriously, I am not lying - this is too rich for even ME to make up! All I could do is laugh and dream up ways of sauteing him for dinner or fantasize about trading him in for a non-shedding, relaxed animal like an armadillo.

Little does he know that the days of his 'reign' over her are short and that, in time, she will do something akin to what I did to our cat Miggs when I was young - take him in the closet and proceed to dress him in a full tea party ensemble including a dress, 4 booties and a bonnet. His day will come, oh yes, and I cannot wait.