The more things change...

I have to be careful how I say this, because Tsatsi is watching every word closely and Sisi is pretending not to be paying attention, but she is sitting right next to her baby.

Hmm…okay…I may be stuck with two cats.  And when I mean stuck, I mean, uh, quite happy, really, despite having clearly stipulated in all my Peace Corps paperwork and interviews that I would only be willing to join their illustrious organization if I did not have to have cats. I needed a cat break since it was so emotionally hard to leave all my babies behind, I didn’t want to go through that again here after two years. I didn’t want the expense, the worry, cat boxes. It was a deal breaker. They assured me that they would not require me to have a cat, and certainly they would be sanctioned if they required me to have as many as two. I explained that two or more had always been a problem for me, due to lack of lap accommodations

Okay, so as you know, I signed the dotted line and off I came to Botswana. How I ended up with Sisi is chronicled elsewhere on this blog. So where did Tsatsi come from?  Well, she spent a few weeks with a dear friend PCV who realized after these weeks that it was too risky with her asthma. She had had a cat before so it hadn’t been such an absurd notion. But as time went on she realized it wouldn’t work.

So she made the 4 hour trek with her counterpart here to bring Tsatsi home again. My plan was to find someone here who wanted the little darling, because my contract only allows for one, and I found a colleague at work who would be willing. So me and my PCV pal are going to split the cost of having Tsatsi spayed and then off she would go to her new home.

Last night after Tsatsi’s ride left her and things calmed down, she went looking for her mother, who had taken up her default hiding position under my bed whenever there is company. She sat at the foot of the bed and waited. I sat in the living room and angsted over whether or not they would kill each other.  I heard some hissing and nice guttural vocalizations, but wasn’t sure who was doing what. After a while, Sisi came out, a little while later, they were chasing each other around the house. Tentatively, but they were definitely reconnecting and it became clear after awhile that the “words” they had exchanged earlier went something like this

“Mom, is that you under there?”

“Eh, yeah, is that you punk?”

“Mommmm. Don’t call me that please, I am almost 6 months old now”

“Whatever.  Where the heck have you been?”

“Me??? Why did you let them take me away from you?”

“I am a cat. I thought you were just going out for awhile. Then I feel asleep. You know how it goes. Anyway…I am glad you are back.”

So they didn’t sleep with me that night, preferring to cuddle on the couch, although Sisi still thinks she is supposed to wake me at 6:30,  even on weekends. The two of them played happily as I did laundry. (At least these kids won’t give me more laundry to do.)

Tsatsi sits on my lap as I type this, Sisi licking Tsatsi sweetly on her head before going to find a blanket to hide under. Crap. I think I now have two cats.  The more they stay the same.