A Love Story Begins on a Sixties Summer Day:

My First Cat

Look at this child. Exploring on the ground, crawling into the lavender, or is it lilac toned heather? What a delightful bonnet around that tiny head. Firm, well-fed arms in action. This isn't even a child, it is an infant, perhaps nine or ten months old. A female infant determined to approach the mystery appearing in front of her range of vision. There, behind the plant, in a clichéd expression of cat enigma, is a black-and-white feline. Long-haired, eyes askew in the typical cat position of curiosity that hovers towards disdain.

The cat is called William, and the baby is me. The photograph was taken by my father, Michael. His fame within the family for taking photos resounds to this day, and I have the beautiful legacy of his work on over a hundred coloured transparencies. As my father died aged twenty-nine, when I was scarcely seven, these photos go beyond nostalgic, and have become a framework that underpins my memory. Sharpens it, perhaps, by giving me details that these days aren’t so easy to recall. The pure colour of that bonnet. The bush in the garden and the determination of my uplifted hand. Naturally, I have no conscious memory of this moment, but it does link to many that came later.

It stands out as a reminder of my early and lifelong association with cats. Endless cats. I do have a memory of when William went missing. My childhood was relatively rural, and we lived near the woods on the edge of the Chiltern Hills. The woods became the place where things went. Nanny’s white budgie, unimaginatively called Snowy, flew away ‘to the woods’. And, later, Nanny told me that William had gone to ‘live in the woods’ where he would be happy with the other animals. Hopefully not eating Snowy, I thought…

I think I knew then what she really meant by saying ‘going to the woods’. It meant that William was dead. For multiple reasons, with multiple parallels, I was often fed with euphemisms for death and illness throughout my childhood.

To this day I retain a sense of frustration – and loss – that William went to live in the woods. And that I was expected to simply accept it. My questions would face resistance and disapproval – they upset Nanny. Nanny didn’t need reminding. And so on.

But William left his legacy as much as he left the strands of his fluffy fur over me and around me, from those early years of my life. The enchantment of cat was cast upon me, and I would never escape.

Looking at this photo – at William – and thinking of the many other cats that came after him, why would I ever want to live without this wondrous and rewarding experience?

Sixty years later, here I am, and still a cat sleeps on my lap. This one is cheeky, cuddly and truly a mini panther. Her name is Pixie.