Bono

Chapter Twenty-three

BECOMING LOCAL

A cat likes to belong, yet retain her outsider status.

Instead of having breakfast alone at home, I now ate at the deli across Second Avenue. The ambience of ordinary people getting ready for their working day was companionable. I liked scraping oatmeal into a paper cup and topping it with walnuts, berries, and an occasional blob of cream. The cappuccino wasn’t bad, either.

When a cop in a UN uniform ordered his omelets in fluent Spanish, I suffered a pang of language envy. The chef cracked three eggs in a pan with expert ease and turned to me.

“You want turs?” he asked.

“Turs?” I asked, a prickle of discomfort crawling down my neck.

The cop looked down at me, amusement in his eye.

“Si,” the chef said, leaning into my face and shouting. “Do you want turs or no!?”

I’d never heard of turs. Maybe it was some kind of taco.

“Toast,” the cop said, breaking into a smile. “He’s saying toast.”

Blushing, I glanced down at the weapon tucked into the cop’s belt. Though he seemed friendly I’ll never get used to policemen with guns. Still, I couldn’t help appreciating the solid lines of his shoulders as he ran a hand through his glossy dark hair.

“Thanks for helping me out,” I said, as the chef passed him the omelet.

“My pleasure, ma’am. You’re not from these parts?”

“No, but I’m having a wonderful time in your city,” I said to avoid risking arrest more than anything else.

“New York!” he said, rolling his eyes. “I’m sick of this city.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“It’s boring.”

I could imagine being wrung out from living in New York, or perhaps in his line of work, even battle worn. But to be bored of New York is surely to be bored with life.

“Where else do you want to live?” I asked.

“I can’t wait to move to a log cabin.”

I’d met people who lived in cabins, admittedly made of asbestos rather than log, and they were desperate to move out.

“Where would you find one of those?” I asked.

His eyes clouded with a dreamy look.

“In the mountains somewhere.”

I didn’t say anything to disillusion him, but he obviously hadn’t tried living in a log cabin lately.

Though I was a foreigner, I no longer felt like a tourist. Like the people trotting behind their dogs along the sidewalks, I’d become a thread in the fabric of the city, an honorary citizen with an animal to go home to.

Locals like me had a different air. We didn’t clutch maps and guidebooks or shuffle about missing everything worth seeing because we were fixated on the map inside our phone. Though we were watchful, we didn’t clutch our handbags as if we were expecting to be mugged any minute.

We reserved the right to complain about the weather, and to exchange glances when a drunk sang loudly off-key in the subway. The tourists were largely invisible to us because they swam around inside their own fish tank, “doing” Times Square, the Empire State Building, and the Statue of Liberty.

I hardly warranted the keys to the city, but my status was assured the day a middle-aged woman wearing the trademark backpack and walking shoes approached.

“Excuse me,” she asked. “Can you tell me if this is the way to Grand Central?”

I could hardly contain my euphoria. Something about me screamed that I was at home in this great city. She’d mistaken me for a local. Her accent sounded Canadian.

“I certainly can,” I said in the tones of a New Yorker being politely helpful to a less fortunate human. “Just keep going straight on down the hill and turn left. You won’t miss it.”

She was pathetically grateful. I said it was nothing and wished her well for the rest of her vacation.

Having grown up in the country and lived in various cities, I understand the tension between town and country. The gap is intensified when the city happens to be the Big Apple. It’s no secret New Yorkers feel superior. I wish I could tell them that from a farmer’s perspective, city people are folks who couldn’t make it in the country.

The tourists were semi-invisible, but I soon realized New Yorkers acknowledge each other, and I was grateful to be included in a casual way. The Indian family who sold flowers from the market waved as I strode down the hill to buy kitty litter. At the pet supply shop, Doris and I could whittle away half an afternoon discussing the merits of hessian versus carpet scratching posts while Bluebell flicked her tail in the window.

Though the handbag salesmen never invited conversation, I was on nodding terms with some of the beggars, especially the one who sat resting his stump on the steps outside our building most afternoons. Remembering what Greg had told me, I cast an eye over the guy’s pockets. If he was carrying a gun, it was a very small one.

Even the people in our building began saying hello. Most of them were single professionals in their mid-thirties. They were far friendlier than most of the neighbors locked in warfare over parking spaces on our dead-end street back in Melbourne. I hadn’t seen or heard any more of Patrick downstairs. He was probably out having lunches with Donna Tartt.

For the first time in my life, I became obsessed with laundry—in a good way. It started when I took my coat to the cleaners on East 44th Street to ask if they could remove the paint speckles. They said it would be no problem. When I found out these cheerful chaps washed and dried clothes for $8 a pound, I was down there every few days with another bundle of laundry. Pressed and sealed inside plastic sheeting, my clothes started to look like they belonged to someone else. No longer the Lady of the Food Stains, I had an impressive collection of wire coat hangers, which I recycled back to them.

Living in a city where every minor annoyance was attended to and solved at an affordable price was becoming addictive. One afternoon, I visited the acupuncturist to see if he could sort out my knee. He started by rattling off the names of all the famous people he’d punctured, which reminded me of Patrick. I wondered if name dropping was a New York disease. After taking my pulse, he shook his head and said I had too much male energy and a terrible liver—neither of which sounded like a compliment.

I limped back up the hill afterward, consoling myself with the thought that for any woman in today’s world, an overdose of male energy is probably a good thing. I’m quietly shocked feminism didn’t take off the way it was supposed to back when we were burning our bras. If today’s young women think sending belfies (photos of their bums) to their boyfriends is liberation, I despair for them and their daughters.

As I opened the door to the apartment, I was astonished when a tiny black figure pranced toward me and greeted me with a welcome meow. I cried out and bent to stroke him, but he danced backward across the floor.

Bono jumped on the bed and watched as I flicked the laptop on. The first Huffington Post blog was up. Not only that, a swarm of readers had posted comments.

Hi Helen, Bono is ADORABLE! Thanks for writing about rescue cats. So many people think they have to buy animals from pet stores. Though I know you can’t bring Bono to Colorado, you’re both in my thoughts.

Dear Mrs. Brown, I live in Moscow, Russia, and I have cared for unwanted cats for the past 17 years. They are my best friends. I hope Bono finds the home he deserves.

Hi, I want a cat like Bono, but we have five already and Mom says that’s enough. When I grow up I’m going to work in a shelter like Bideawee. Love, Nick, Little Rock, Arkansas, USA, The World, The Universe.

Dear Helen, Our entire vet clinic is in love with Bono! We’d love it if you could take time out to speak at a fundraiser to raise awareness around rescue animals. Arianna, LA.

Hi Helen, Rescue animals are the best. I’ve had shelter cats all my life. They’re so grateful and loving. Sometimes it’s been hard to know who’s been rescuing who! Buckets of love to you and Bono, Gina, Phoenix, Arizona.

Dear Mrs Brown, I love Bono, but I can’t adopt him because I live in Auckland, New Zealand. Instead, I will be visiting our local shelter this weekend. If I can find a cat who looks anything like him, or even one that doesn’t, he’ll be coming home with me. Keep up the good work. Yours, Andrea.