Rainbow Cats
I am walking one glorious day. I am walking out of our two-story rented home, sidestepping the pool of algae forming in front of our gate (a cesspool of malaria), turning right, then left, then right again, and ultimately out of the quaint suburban village.
But, alas, somewhere between two car humps with yellow and black stripes, a putrid odor seems to pollute the air. It is roughly 20 meters from Gate 8, through which I pass every morning at 6 a.m. to go to my summer classes (Hello, Kuya Guard), and then at noon (Hello, Kuya Guard) to go home. There, in the middle of the street, is a flattened corpse. This may sound disturbing, hence I shall use a simple adjective to describe the grotesque sight: ugly.
It is (was) a cat, much like the cute ones you see at the pet store, the grimy ones you see rummaging through nonbiodegradable trash, and the one you remember alluding to Schrödinger if you’re a physics or Big Bang Theory fan. Speaking of which, there’s quantum indeterminacy: The cat is both dead and alive in the quantum state. I, being the observer, most certainly can assure you that this organism is dead. But, I wonder, do the newly elected senators know that this poor cat is putrefying in public? Does President Noynoy Aquino know that the Philippines has lost one of the contributors of oxygen in the atmosphere? Do the Taiwanese know that they should also be protesting the unjustified killing of this cat? Does the Department of Environment and Natural Resources know that someone has killed a cat without permission? Does the National Bureau of Investigation know that somewhere in my peaceful village lurks a murderer? Where are the media? Where’s Vice Ganda? Where’s the woman screaming for redemption?
Till now the cat continues to decay. Slowly, he or she (too flat to determine) is losing his or her fur. He or she is getting eaten by the invisible scavengers, being consumed by the circle of life, succumbing to the inevitability of the food chain, of energy distribution, of entropy and decay, of quantum physics, of differentiation. How many more times will this cat be differentiated before he or she finally turns to zero?
I proceed to my math class and am plagued by thoughts of the cat the whole time. I go home feeling typically forlorn because of my lack of mathematical prowess. There I am, slumping like a fool, feeling bitter toward my parents for the absence of math genes in their passed-on chromosomes, blaming meiosis, the education system, the world, when I see the dead cat again.
And beside him (or her) is another cat, with fur white as snow and nose pink as a rose. I am painfully reminded of a White Lady by this mysterious-looking cat. Hence, I shall refer to him (I checked) as PutiCat (Puting Cat).
PutiCat seems to be scrutinizing the face of his dead companion. Maybe PutiCat is the dead cat’s close friend, and they shared secrets, talked about girls or DOTA or LoL, teasing each other. Maybe he is the dead cat’s lover or paramour, and they had an adulterous relationship. Even worse, if they are both male, maybe homosexuality is looked down upon by the Cat society.
But all these thoughts of blooming relationships come to a halt when PutiCat slowly begins to lick the remnants of what seems to be the face of the dead cat. I have to say that in my entire life, I have come upon only very few situations that baffle me, like this one. The first will have to be the death of Mufasa due to Scar’s betrayal. The second is Sakuragi Hanamichi’s epic basketball fail in the first or second episode of “Slam Dunk.” This is the only other.
It takes a few minutes of meaningless gawking before I realize that I may be intruding into their little private moment. I feel like a voyeur. When PutiCat ceases his ministrations, his head slowly moves to face me. The air around us becomes both stinky and awkward, not exactly a good first-impression kind of thing. I feel like Eliza in the old cartoon “The Wild Thornberrys”—you know, the one who can talk to animals. And no matter how pathetic it seems, deep inside I am waiting for him to, you know, talk to me so that I can be the Cat Whisperer.
But of course, sadly, unfortunately, annoyingly, he does not.
The white cat just stares at me for a second or two, advances toward me in a feline, sensual fashion, passes by me, and disappears into the tall grasses of the empty lot at my side. When he vanishes, it is “The Life of Pi” all over again. I almost say, “Goodbye, Richard Parker.”
And now, feeling like it is The End, I make my way home. And as I do, I can’t help but want to be the furious father who’s intent on finding his kidnapped daughter. I want to phone the cat’s killer and say huskily, “I will look for you, I will find you, and I will kill you.” But, of course, the killer will never be found. The police will never care. The government won’t even spare my 20-page report a glance. At best, I will probably be referred to the Cat Adoption Center, or the mental ward if I become too persistent.
In conclusion, no one cares. No one cares for some nobody cat. Some insignificant being, with no bureaucratic potential or economic value. Someone who cannot pay taxes, cannot rebel, cannot complain, cannot perform, cannot study, cannot work, can easily be killed off in society.
When I first saw the dead cat, I thought it looked weird and eerie. When I went home, tormented by the prospects of failing and my insignificance in math, I saw a murder, or more precisely, I saw a metaphor of death. Like the death of Gregor Samsa in “Metamorphosis,” no one will care, not Loren Legarda, not the President, not even my idol Vice Ganda. Maybe it’s because everyone has gotten so used to them around, that their very existence is forgotten.
Hence, what society needs is to rainbow all these cats.
Maybe one day, the government and society will begin to notice that there are hundreds of skinny, limping, hungry rainbow cats meandering through the metro. Rainbow cats waking up at 3 a.m. in order to walk for 10 kilometers to some dilapidated school. Rainbow cats leaving school without a diploma. Rainbow cats getting impregnated over and over again, giving birth to another line of rainbow cats. Rainbow cats alternating between receiving money and driving. Rainbow cats passing soiled envelopes in jeepneys. Rainbow cats wearing long-sleeved jackets to hide the scratches near their paws. Rainbow cats hiding in their closets. Rainbow cats getting beaten up by their fellow rainbow cats. Rainbow cats selling blood for money. Rainbow cats offering pleasure for money. Rainbow cats deprecating themselves on live television just to earn money. Rainbow cats chilling at an overhead pass.
Maybe one day, the government and society will transform into PutiCats. So that all the cats in the Philippines can lick each other’s wounds, say “Hey, how’s life?” and check if another’s still alive.
Maybe one day, we can all become Cat Whisperers and say goodbye to our own Richard Parker.
Mariel Alonzo, 17, is a mechanical engineering student at the University of the Philippines Diliman.
