Dewey: The Small-Town Library Cat Who Touched The World

Chapter 15

Spencer’s Favorite Cat

About a month after Dewey’s escape, Jodi left Spencer. I wasn’t sure I could afford to send her to college, and she didn’t want to stay home. Jodi wanted to travel, so she took a job as a nanny in California and saved money for college. I’m sure it didn’t hurt that California was a long way from Mom.

I brought Dewey home for her last weekend. As always, he was stuck to Jodi’s side like a flesh-hugging magnet. I think he loved nighttime with her most of all. As soon as Jodi pulled down the covers, Dewey was in her bed. Actually he beat her into bed. By the time she finished brushing her teeth, he was sitting on her pillow, ready to curl up beside her. As soon as she lay down, he was plastered against her face. He wouldn’t even let her breathe. She shoved him down into the covers, but he came back. Shove. On her face. Shove. Across her neck.

“Stay down, Dewey.”

He finally relented and slept by her side, locked onto her hip. She could breathe, but she couldn’t turn over. Did he know our girl was leaving, maybe for good? When he slept with me, Dewey was in and out of bed all night, exploring the house one minute and snuggling the next. With Jodi, he never left. At one point, he wandered down to attack her feet, which were under the covers, but that was as far as he went. Jodi didn’t get any sleep that night.

The next time Dewey came to my house, Jodi was gone. He found a way to stay close to her, though, by spending the night in Jodi’s room, curled up on the floor next to her heater, no doubt dreaming of those warm summer nights spent snuggled up to Jodi’s side.

“I know, Dewey,” I said to him. “I know.”

A month later I took Dewey for his first official photograph. I’d like to say it was for sentimental reasons, that my world was changing and I wanted to freeze that moment, or that I realized Dewey was on the cusp of something far bigger than either of us ever imagined. But the real reason was a coupon. Rick Krebsbach, the town photographer, was offering pet photographs for ten dollars.

Dewey was such an easygoing cat that I convinced myself getting a professional portrait made of him, in a professional portrait studio, would be easy. But Dewey hated the studio. As soon as we walked in, his head was swiveling, his eyes looking at everything. I put him in the chair, and he immediately hopped out. I picked him up and put him in the chair again. I took one step back, and Dewey was gone.

“He’s nervous. He hasn’t been out of the library much,” I said as I watched Dewey sniff the photo backdrop.

“That’s nothing,” Rick said.

“Pets aren’t easy?”

“You have no idea,” he said as we watched Dewey dig his head under a pillow. “One dog tried to eat my camera. Another dog actually ate my fake flowers. Now that I think about it, he puked on that pillow.”

I picked Dewey up quickly, but my touch didn’t calm him. He was still looking around, more nervous than interested.

“There’s been quite a bit of unfortunate peeing. I had to throw away a sheet. I sanitize everything, of course, but to an animal like Dewey it must smell like a zoo.”

“He’s not used to other animals,” I said, but I knew that wasn’t quite right. Dewey never cared about other animals. He always ignored the Seeing Eye dog who came into the library. He even ignored the Dalmatian. This wasn’t fear; it was confusion. “He knows what’s expected of him in the library, but he doesn’t understand this place.”

“Take your time.”

A thought. “May I show Dewey the camera?”

“If you think it will help.”

Dewey posed for photographs at the library all the time, but those were personal cameras. Rick’s camera was a large, boxy, professional model. Dewey had never seen one of those before, but he was a fast learner.

“It’s a camera, Dewey. Camera. We’re here to get your picture taken.”

Dewey sniffed the lens. He leaned back and looked at it, then sniffed it again. I could feel him getting less tense, and I knew he understood.

I pointed. “Chair. Sit in the chair.”

I put him down. He sniffed up and down every leg, and twice on the seat. Then he jumped into the chair and stared right at the camera. Rick hurried over and snapped six photos.

“I can’t believe it,” he said as Dewey climbed down off the chair.

I didn’t want to tell Rick, but this happened all the time. Dewey and I had a means of communicating even I didn’t understand. He always seemed to know what I wanted, but unfortunately that didn’t mean he was always going to obey. I didn’t even have to say brush or bath; all I had to do was think about them, and Dewey disappeared. I remember passing him in the library one afternoon. He looked up at me with his usual lazy indifference. Hi, how you doing?

I thought, “Oh, there are two knots of fur on his neck. I should get the scissors and cut them off.” As soon as the idea formed in my mind, whoosh, Dewey was gone.

But since his escape, Dewey had been using his powers for good, not mischief. He not only anticipated what I wanted, he did it. Not when a brushing or a bath was involved, of course, but for library business. That was one reason he was so willing to have his photograph taken. He wanted to do what was best for the library.

“He knows it’s for the library,” I told Rick, but I could tell he wasn’t buying it. Why, after all, would a cat care about a library? And how could he connect a library with a photo studio a block away? But it was the truth, and I knew it.

I picked Dewey up and petted his favorite spot, the top of his head between the ears. “He knows what a camera is. He’s not afraid of it.”

“Has he ever posed before?”

“At least two or three times a week. For visitors. He loves it.”

“That doesn’t sound like a cat.”

I wanted to tell him Dewey wasn’t just any cat, but Rick had been taking pet photographs for the past week. He’d probably heard it a hundred times already.

And yet if you see Dewey’s official photograph, which Rick shot that day (it’s on the cover of this book), you can tell immediately he’s not just another cat. He’s beautiful, yes, but more than that, he’s relaxed. He has no fear of the camera, no confusion about what’s going on. His eyes are wide and clear. His fur is perfectly groomed. He doesn’t look like a kitten, but he doesn’t look like a grown cat, either. He’s a young man getting his college graduation photograph taken, or a sailor getting a memento for his girl back home before shipping off on his first tour. His posture is remarkably straight, his head cocked, his eyes staring calmly into the camera. I smile every time I see that photo because he looks so serious. He looks like he’s trying to be strong and handsome but can’t quite pull it off because he’s so darn cute.

A few days after receiving the finished photographs, I noticed the local Shopko, a large general merchandise chain like Wal-Mart or Kmart, was holding a pet photo contest to raise money for charity. You paid a dollar to vote, and the money was used to fight muscular dystrophy. This was typical of Spencer. There was always a fund-raiser, and it was always supported by local citizens. Our radio station, KCID, promoted these efforts. The paper often ran a story. The turnout was usually overwhelming. We don’t have a ton of money in Spencer, but if someone needs a hand, we’re happy to provide it. That’s civic pride.

On a whim, I entered Dewey in the contest. The photo was for library promotion purposes, after all, and wasn’t this a perfect opportunity to promote this special aspect of the library? A few weeks later, Shopko strung a dozen photos, all of cats and dogs, on a wire in the front of the store. The town voted, and Dewey won by a landslide. He got more than 80 percent of the votes, seven times as many as the runner-up. It was ridiculous. When the store called to tell me the results, I was almost embarrassed.

Part of the reason Dewey won so overwhelmingly was the photograph. Dewey is staring at you, asking you to look back at him. He makes a personal connection, even if there is a touch of stateliness in his pose.

Part of the reason was Dewey’s looks. He’s a 1950s matinee idol, suave and cool. He’s so handsome you have to love him.

Part of the reason was Dewey’s personality. Most cats in photographs look scared to death, desperate to sniff the camera, or disgusted by the whole process—or often all three. Most dogs look like they are about to go absolutely bonkers, knock over everything in the room, get themselves wound up in an electrical cord, and then eat the camera. Dewey looks calm.

But mostly, Dewey trounced the competition because the town had adopted him. Not just the regular library patrons, I realized for the first time, but the whole town. While I wasn’t watching, while I was preoccupied with school and remodeling and Jodi, Dewey was quietly working his magic. The stories, not just about his rescue but about his life and relationships, were seeping down into the cracks and sprouting new life. He wasn’t just the library’s cat, not anymore. He was Spencer’s cat. He was our inspiration, our friend, our survivor. He was one of us. And at the same time, he was ours.

Was he a mascot? No. Did he make a difference in the way the town thought about itself? Absolutely. Not to everyone, of course, but to enough. Dewey reminded us, once again, that we were a different kind of town. We cared. We valued the small things. We understood life wasn’t about quantity but quality. Dewey was one more reason to love this hardy little town on the Iowa plains. The love of Spencer, the love of Dewey, it was all intermingled in the public mind.