Dear Neighbor

Filed under "Letters I'd like to Send".

Dear Next Door Neighbor,
I get it. You're an old lady with cats. At last count, I think you have five of them. That's cool. You're the old cat lady--that's your gig. Henry enjoys meowing at them whenever he sees them. What I don't seem to understand is why you let them roam the neighborhood. I was okay with it, sort of, when they'd wander into my back yard. Even when they crept into my backyard to poo. Even okay with it when Henry got to watch one of them drag a mouse from under your back porch to eat on the fence between our yards. (Actually, I really wasn't okay with that. It made Henry scream and I threw up a little in my mouth.)

You see, I hate cats. Wait, no, I don't think that quite explains the extent to which I detest cats. As much as I love my husband, that's how much I hate cats. I oppose cats as a species. I even look down upon people who like cats. (Sorry friends with cats. But it's the truth. There is only one thing on the planet I hate more than cats--Nicholas Sparks books and movies.) Let me explain. For starters, I'm allergic to cats. And I like to breath. Secondly, cats aren't friendly. In fact, they are snobby and stand offish. I find it offensive that a pet would make its owner earn its love. If I wanted that kind of pet, I'd adopt a middle schooler. Thirdly, what's up with the furr balls? Sure, dogs lick themselves, but they don't get all bulimic about it. Fourth, maybe I just saw it in a Stephen King movie, but I think cats are capable of eating human souls. Which may lead to the fifth reason I hate, no, detest, no, loathe cats--cat people. Seriously. You cat people are weirdos. You wear kitty sweatshirts. Have kitty posters. Hang Christmas stockings up for your cats and talk to me about them in the same way I talk about Henry. (News flash--pets aren't people.) Knit kitty sweaters out of kitty hair. And cat people have no idea that there are non-cat people out there, so when I come to your house and say, "Oh, you have a cat, I'm allergic," you don't feel the need to put your cat elsewhere. You, in fact, think it is cute when your soul-sucking snob of a cat wants to jump into Henry's bucket car seat. (I know of only one cat owner who is not like this--my dear friend Ann. Of all the times I've been to her house, the only way I know she has a cat is because he was on her Christmas card. A fact I'm only forgiving her because she said her husband made her do it. So maybe D is the crazy cat man and that seems to be Ann's problem, not mine.) Dog people aren't like this. The closest dog people get to that level of crazydom is those bone shaped bumper stickers. But even those people put the dog in the laundry room when they throw a party.

I think it can be aptly said that I hate cats more today than yesterday, but not as much as tomorrow. So, neighbor, when I am bringing in groceries from my car and leave the front door open, it really is not okay that one of your practically feral kitties ran into my house. To say I jumped up my own fanny would be putting it nicely. You are lucky that your cat is fast, because Henry was chasing it, screaming "Meow Meow," while I was trying to lovingly kick it out the front door. It did, finally, make it back outside, but not before pooping in my foyer. So let me add to my list of reasons why I hate cats--cat poo.

My father thinks I should buy a BB gun to teach your cats to stay out of my yard and home. I will not resort to violence. But be on alert, cat lady neighbor, that my sister has teenage sons who have air soft pistols and they would love to resort to violence for me.

Thank you,
Your neighbor

PS. It would also be great if you could encourage the grown children who live with you to put on more clothing when they do yard work. Your son seems to be asking a lot of his shorts's drawstrings.