When I was born in 1985, the world was a different place. Many of you probably weren’t alive yet, and that’s OK. Young people are our future, I always say, or at least I would if I could talk. Fact is, I couldn’t talk before all my teeth fell out. These days when I meow, it sounds like the wind whipping through a forest of dead trees. When I purr, it sounds like metal shards being poured into a woodchipper. When I eat, those around me turn in horror. I am extremely fucking old.
When my mother gave birth to me and my siblings, Ronald Reagan was president. In those days I didn’t pay much attention to politics, mostly because I didn’t feel like I had to. There was always food around the house and a toilet brush that needed savaging. I was young and carefree; it didn’t bother me if he slashed social programs or spurred a catastrophic debt crisis. My coat was shiny, my nails were sharp and the yard was filled with birds just asking me to murder them and leave their carcasses strategically placed around the kitchen. Frankly, I had better things to do.
But age has a way of catching up with you, and you start to become aware of the world around you. The Clinton years were good and filled with wet food, and even Bush and that run-in with the dog failed to puncture the veil of peace I felt when tearing the shit out of a new couch or rolling around on a pair of freshly laundered black pants.
I’ve seen a lot in 31 years, but I have never, ever seen anything like Donald Trump. I may be deaf in one ear, but when he’s on TV, I wish it were both. I did not live this long just to see an impaired hobgoblin get his gherkin fingers on the nuclear codes. I did not age into a gnarled elder cat just to watch this country get destroyed by a partially digested pork rind.
I’m going strong now, but soon, I’ll be gone. I’m technically 141 years old—it’s just science. I’ve seen many things I never thought I’d be around for—Macbooks, smartphones, the wicked, accursed Roomba. But I’d rather face the Roomba any day—I’d rather face an ARMY of Roombas—over a Trump presidency. And I’m just a fucking cat.
Thank you for reading. This has been incredibly hard to type.
Nutmeg
GET JEZEBEL RIGHT IN YOUR INBOX
Still here. Still without airbrushing. Still with teeth.
