At Last!

For years now, it has offended me.

I do not appreciate things that make Anne Elisabeth exclaim, "Oh, how pretty!" that aren't me.

She had (do, please, note the past tense) this flower. A blown glass, blue and green flower, made by her professional glass-blower uncle. It offended my eyes. From the moment I first saw it, I knew that it must die.

But wretched Anne Elisabeth never could see eye-to-eye with me on that subject.

She first put it on her glass coffee table. I did not like it there. Pretty things that are not me should not be on such prominent display. So I knocked it off.

Alas! We lived in an apartment with carpet. The Offensive Object survived.

She moved it then to a bookshelf. I found it. It survived once more. She put it on a windowsill. I found it. Yet again, my plans for destruction were foiled.

I began to wonder if I should ever succeed in ridding the world of its offensive, sparkly, artistic beauty? I mean, it's just redundant to have more than one pretty thing in the same house, am I right? I make it a point to knock down any pretty things Anne Elisabeth insists on putting around, bringing the house into a place of perfect simplistic purity focused on . . . me!

It's all for the sake of art, I tell you.

Anyway, she married dearest, darlingest, beautifulest Rohan, and we were packed off to Rooglewood. And she hid the blue flower away from me, putting it in The Bedroom.

The Bedroom, which is off-limits to kitties. Which, of course, makes it so very alluring.

Rarely do any of us find an opportunity to slip through the Mystical Portal into that Forbidden Otherworld of Bedroom. But yesterday . . . Ah! Yesterday! Anne Elisabeth was vacuuming (see how wretched she is? I mean, who does that? On purpose?), and she left the door to The Bedroom open while vacuuming in there. Naturally, Marmaduke, the Minion and I all took the opportunity to duck in under the bed, hiding beneath the bed skirt.

Well, she caught Marmaduke. And she caught the Minion. But I am ever-so sly and ever-so slinky! She didn't even realize I was in there.

She left, shutting the door behind her, and continued on her way down the hall.

I slipped out from under the bed, hopped up onto the dresser, and what do you think I saw?

"At last! We meet again, Glass Flower!"

I knew it would not escape me forever.

I'm afraid I made a bit of a tactical error, however. I lingered too long, basking in the moment of supreme victory (as foretold by the hard wooden floor waiting down below). Just as I was batting the Offensive Object on its way to doom . . . Anne Elisabeth turned off the vacuum.

CRASH!!!!!!

Oops. She probably heard that.

The next few moments were a bit of a blur. There were storming footsteps. There was a door slamming open. I saw a glimpse of wretched fury in my human's face.

"MINERVA LOUISE!!!! Bad, BAD KITTY!"

It's not often that I manage to rile Anne Elisabeth up to a point of such ire. It's a bit of an awesome sight. She scruffed me and demanded a contrite apology (As if!), spanked me on my tail (Indignity!), and tossed me into the studio, slamming the door behind.

There I was left in solitary confinement.

It's a bit lonely.

I mewed piteously for hours, but Anne Elisabeth has a heart of stone.

But I listened to the sounds of sweeping and vacuuming as she gathered the shattered remains of the Offensive Object. Imprisonment was a worthy price for so sweet a victory.

Take that, Glass Flower.