We Three Kings

I love getting presents, and this week I got three.

I've been looking after my neighbour's cats while they've been away over the holidays, and earlier in the week all three of them returned, bearing gifts they traverse afar. I really don't know what myrrh is, but I did get gold and something not dissimilar to frankincense.

You can learn about a person from the gifts they give you.

Sunaja, whose cat, Gambit, is a beautiful and very friendly orange tabby, has been in India for a month with her father. Gambit and I have been having a fine time watching Trading Spaces, which seems always to be on, no matter what time I turn on the TV. I don't have cable, so visiting a cat who does is as much fun for me as it is for him to have a lap to sit on for an hour. Today, he's the happiest cat in T'ranna, because his mommy is home. Sunaja brought me a lovely wooden box full of Darjeeling tea.

Donnatella and Ermenegildo — I call them The Spanish Cats because it's easier to pronounce — are owned by a couple whose family lives in Colombia. Every Christmas they go for a long visit — "they" being Maria and Carlos, not Donnatella and Ermenegildo.

Though I am more familiar with Maria and Carlos's home than I am with them personally, I can tell you they are handsome and stylish. Maria is an artist. The spare bedroom in their home is her studio. I like her work: abstract paintings with lots of reds and blacks. She brought me an unusual, museum-inspired gold stickpin; a concentric swirl design, and a brochure from the Museo del Oro in Bogotá that explains the inspiration for the art. Then apologized because it's in Spanish.

The Italian Cats live with Angela, and are white Persians named Leo and Daphne. In the summer when Angela shaves them she leaves little tufts of fur around their paws and at the ends of their tails, which makes them look exactly like Truffula Trees.

Angela is a Life Coach — yes, that's what it says on her business card — who's looking for a husband, and with whom I've had many wine-filled discussions about men, love, and sex.

Angela went to New York for the weekend with her boyfriend, Luciano. I asked her to bring me an interesting New York souvenir. I've been to the City many, many times; even worked there for a few months, so I've already got the key chains and fridge magnets. Angela knows this. She brought me a black thong with the I♥NY logo on the front.

There's only one man I'd consider modeling this souvenir for, but for now it's going in the drawer with the red plaid schoolgirl outfit.

I hope she wasn't thinking that it'd be helpful for me in finding a husband... because me, I ain't looking. I had one for a long, long time, and now that he's gone I have no desire to break in another.

Funny, Angela was married before, too. She has nothing good to say about her X. Apparently he cheated on her, and generally treated her like dirt. You gotta wonder about men, I mean, Angela's stunningly beautiful, and she's Italian, from Rome. You can picture her, right? I can't understand why she wants another husband, but she does. She's quite methodical about it. She doesn't date to have fun, she dates to evaluate men as to their potential husbandworthiness.

Then again, I've seen Luciano, and he doesn't look like husband material at all. Plenty of fun, though, I bet.

When people bring you gifts it really is the thought that counts. Because it's the thought, the effort, the knowing of you, the giftee, that determines whether the gift will be a success.

On the other hand, when you give a gift you never really know if you've been successful, because the people to whom you give a gift always say they like it, even when they don't. There's that one split second, though, when they first lay eyes on it that, if you're watching closely, you can discern their true response. The practised viewer of Trading Spaces understands the moment to which I refer.

I think I'll try on that thong, just in case.

In the next story, Postmodern Sass makes up with her friend Simon, whose wedding she didn't attend because Jack stood her up.