Mired in Sunday afternoon ennui

Who doesn't get mired in Sunday afternoon ennui? For those of us who can still work Monday through Friday , Sunday afternoons mark that turning-point where your care-free attitude shifts toward the realization that you are doomed, that work looms in front of you--lurches over you. Your thoughts turn towards the office. You begin having negative fantasies about your co-workers and supervisors, imagining scenarios in which you finally stand your ground, you finally tell off that s.o.b. and let him know that things are going to be different from now on and that henceforth you will be respected for the person you are--the three-dimensional bundle of experience, dashed hopes, love longed-for and lost. Laughs shared. Tears concealed. You will be addressed as sir, you will be treated as an equal. Your ideas and efforts will never again be second-guessed, and people will move aside as you swagger down the hall.

You are not just some logistical numbers-crunching. You have great ideas, you have great plans. You can make a difference in the world. Set things right. Make a child laugh. You once thought of becoming a philosopher. You were going to shake the foundations of academia and your lessers would clamor before you to ponder your acumen.

On Saturday there is still hope. There is still so much time to do chores. Wait until Sunday. Now you can relax, lounge around in your pajamas, have another mojito.

There is no turning back on Sunday afternoon. The weather finally starts to clear. The sun comes out for a dress-rehearsal of the week to come of crisp blue skies , beckoning to you from your cubicle. Should you try to do something now? Salvage those few hours of freedom? The remote slack in your hand, you think of going out, calling up a friend, going down to the city.

No. You flip to the travel channel, look at the beaches, the cobble-stone streets, the wind-surfers The tour guide goes into the public market, samples some local delicacy, exchanges pleasantries with the vendors, and tells you where you can rent bicycles.

Then arrivederci and on to the poker semi-finals.

Emilia

I adopted Emilia back in January, after the snow finally started melting off. I got her at PAWS, which I would highly recommend to anyone. The PAWS adoption center is set up as a cageless environment, where potential parents can come into a large room where all the cats lounge about, and try to find the best match. I first spotted Emilia napping on a cat tree. She roused briefly when I petted her, then drifted back into her catnap. There were several juvenile cats following me around saying, 'pick me! pick me! But living in a small apt. I knew it would not be fair to put a gregarious cat in an environment where it would spend most of its time alone. So I picked Emilia, who was laid back and ambivalent. With her supple black fur, she reminded me of my friends' cat whom I bonded with while staying with them during my brief period of unemployment.

I spent some time alone with her in the cat time-out room, and she was very affectionate and seemed to take to me quite well. So off we went out into the crisp January air, Emilia in her little cardboard cat carrier, and me with a folder full of vet files and pet store coupons.
She spent the first day under the bed in the corner, and all I saw of her was a pair of enchanting golden eyes staring out at me.

We get along quite well. She loves the brush, and can't get enough of the little catnip mice. She dutifully removes their felt tails, then places them at my bedroom door during the night so that I might snack on them when I get up in the morning.

I don't think that Emilia appreciates at all the small fortune that I paid out for her benefit. The cat carrier, gourmet catfood, the scratch boards, the hepa-filter (more for my benefit than hers). Her favorite toy is a twist tie that she bats along the floor with vigor.
I believe that Emilia looks to the hepa-filter as an ersatz mother. Its low soothing whir draws her to sit in front of it, where she allows it to extract the dander from her pelt.

Emilia does not like to be picked up, but at one point a couple of weeks ago I made the mistake of thinking that Emilia and I had gotten to a stage of familiarity where she would make an exception with me. As I now examine my fading scar I see the folly of my thinking. Everyone has boundaries that they would like to be respected, and Emilia communicated to me that I had crossed one of her boundaries, and must pay with the claw.

Aside from that we get along fine. She announces to me when she would like to be fed. She doesn't meow, per se, but rather chatters. She chatters quite often, even if there is food in her bowl. Once when I got home from work she emerged from the cabinet where the catfood was stored at that time, and walked over to the cat dish and started chattering, as if she hadn't been stuffing herself all day.
She meows all the time, and I thought that maybe something was wrong with her, then I reminded myself that she is a female.