Lackey on reincarnation

Alas, poor Jim

A mile south of us is the Akatarawa Road, famous for its narrow chundiferous corners, and infamous as a dropping-off spot for unwanted pets. The good burghers of the Upper Hutt, tiring of the company of their cats and dogs, drive them over the top of the Akatarawa. There they leave them, completely disoriented after 108 of the aforementioned bends, to stagger off downhill into unfamiliar Kapiti.

To our north, and prevalently up-wind, is a piggery - a foul smelling, pestilential blot on the landscape.

The upshot of this juxtaposition of seemingly unrelated geographical features is that our hillside is a veritable passing parade of disaffected and lonely cats ( the dogs, mercifully, can’t manage the fences). To a lonely and hungry cat, it would appear, the odour of a pig is redolent of both food and succour. Pigs (plural) is ambrosia.

One such passer-by was Thompson, a sleek, inscrutable and very beautiful Siamese. Why anyone would want to excommunicate such a beast quite escapes me, but there he was. Breaking our strict if heartless rule, we fed and encouraged him and he became part of our family.

How did we know his name was Thompson? Jim Thompson, you will remember, was the American merchant adventurer who, with a little help from Jackie Kennedy, brought Thai silk to the attention of the world of fashion. Jim went missing from his Bankok home in the early seventies and hadn’t been seen since. Since we knew of no other missing Siamese, we naturally assumed that this was he. There was certainly no evidence to the contrary.

After several years with us, it was time for another reincarnation. Thompson curled himself up under a hot water pipe in an inaccessible part of our basement and passed, as it were, on. For some time thereafter, whenever it rained, we would get a whiff of the mummifying remains. But of Thompson reincarnate, we have seen no evidence. We still get lots of visiting cats but it seems hardly likely he’d choose to return as another cat.

The other day we had the builder renew a portion of the floor. There, in full skeletal glory, was the last of Thompson.

" Alas, poor Thompson. I knew him , Sean" (for that’s our builder’s name)
" A fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy"

Sean gave me one of his looks and carried on ripping up the floor.

This was first published in the Capital Times Wellington in 2001