Coffee, Olives & Cats
You never know what travel might do to you. I mean, yeah, all that deep stuff. But even my tastes are changing.
(Photo by Hurina)
Take coffee. Somehow, back in the early 90s, when putting a Starbucks in a Starbucks was a funny joke, I just never needed the caffeine. And who wanted something bitter? Blech. But it was also about the morning ritual. I just couldn’t be bothered. In fact, I frequently wondered how people could spend precious time and dollars on mere liquid with a clearly marketeered mocha-triple-blend-Indochina title. But, I’ve come around. Sugar, milk, and the schwe schwe (slowly slowly) inshallah (God Willing) Middle East attitude, is making me take time to stop and drink the coffee. And it tastes good.
Olives. In Greece, Andy turned me onto the garlic-stuffed variety. Then I found them bursting with almonds. In Turkey, there was the olive farm. It seems only right to consume the product you grow, right? My father was a corn and soybean farmer for a fifteen years. While his kind of corn fed mainly cattle, I took pride in consuming the little yellow kernels off the cob, as if I was somehow helping to earn our living. So when picking them by day, I knew that all olives, which lets face it, are really just salt and oil dressed up in a silky cape, must become a part of my life. And oh, how they have.
Cats. When I was 7 or 8, I got bit by a cat. Looking back, I see that this particular cat was tired of my endless game called “I-want-to-hold-you. No-I-REALLY-want-to-hold-you.” But I avoided cats from then on. A decade later, my roommate in college, as part of joint custody with an ex-boyfriend, exposed me to Alex, the evil of all felines. Likely due to kittyhood trauma, this cat was fearless and defensive 24/7. A hisser and a scratcher, at parties, she’d perch on the arm of the couch and swat at people walking by. What’s hard to believe is that my roommate then married my brother and so this cat has become part of my FAMILY! But no matter. From this, I entered into a full-on cat-phobia, including nightmares. If anyone argued, pop culture was on my side. From Lady and the Tramp to Pet Cemetery, the cat had been typecast as a villain who was always picking on the dumb blonde dog long ago.
But at the olive farm in Turkey, for reasons a therapist will one day determine, I withdrew from my usual position within the skin of the social scene and found connection and reassurance with fur. I felt more at one with the animals. In particular, petting the cat, this self-sufficient creature which cleaned itself constantly (when I was, at the time, relegated to just a few showers a week,) seemed like a win-win situation. Somehow, my need to nurture finally swelled past human relationships.
However, upon wandering the streets of foreign cities ever since, and witnessing just how defensive cats are, especially compared to their canine counterpart, I realize that what I’ve never liked about cats was what I’ve never liked about myself. They’re always freaking out as if every passing human is plotting to kill them or they’re not gonna get enough milk. It’s as if I have realized, noting the goodwill and generosity of every stranger, that the world is a good place. That I shouldn’t be a fighter, but a lover. And after crossing that line, I looked back to the see the cold, bitchy cat, armor still strapped across its fur, paws up, ready for a rumble. So I went back, scooped it into my arms for life and consider it my duty to beckon this beast toward a better place.
