While we’ve all been riding the rollercoaster of March weather, it seems that the one who has taken it the hardest around here has been HarryHarryHarry. Now that both of our cats are getting a little long in the tooth, their resiliency in the face of unpleasant weather has ratcheted down a notch or two. Maynard, who is two years older than Harry, and officially a feline senior citizen, took one look at our very first snowfall, said “fuck that bullshit” and has spent the winter pretending that the outside world doesn’t exist. But Maynard has never needed outside time the way Harry does.
Harry was simply born to be an outdoor cat. Letting him spend time outdoors was a life-changing experience for him and for us. It’s been his fortune and ours that most of the last several winters have been below-average in snow accumulation, so that going out during the winter months was easily done except in the coldest times. Even Maynard was usually willing to spend a little time outdoors if the ground was bare. But this winter has given us well over the average snowfall, with lots of cold weather and little melting between storms. That is, until the last week or two, as the tendrils of spring have started spreading into our corner of North America. At some point in February, Harry’s overwhelming need to go outdoors finally bested his intense dislike of walking in the snow, and he had resumed taking his morning constitutional every day after eating his breakfast, for which he was rewarded with enough days with temperatures above 40 that the snow was mostly gone.
Then we got pummeled with that snowstorm over the first weekend of March that covered the whole eastern half of the country. When he meowed for the door that Monday morning, I knew it was going to come as a rude shock to Harry. It was a rude shock to everyone, but at least most people had been a little prepared by the endless panic-mongering of the weather reports. Harry doesn’t pay attention to weather reports. So I went with him to the back door and swung it open for him.
His whole furry orange body froze with shock and then visibly slumped with dismay. The snow on the steps was so deep and so fluffy that the one step he took sank him up to his shoulder. He thought about it for a long time, stepping backward and forward and not finding any spot where he would not sink, then turned to the doorjamb and scratched the side (even though he has no front claws), which is his signal that he has changed his mind about the whole thing and really only wanted a stretch in the first place.
The temperature rebounded quickly after that storm, and by last weekend we were once again flirting with 60-degree temperatures and bare ground, so he didn’t let himself be too defeated and was once again going outside of his own volition, if a bit grudgingly. Maynard even decided that it was enough like spring that he could risk it. Then on Monday, three inches of gloppy wet snow. Those of us who have lived here a long time will tell you that this is SOP for March — a meteorological schizophrenia with occasional psychosis, but we know that the outcome is weighted in favor of spring. I didn’t even bother to clear the snow from the back steps on Monday, knowing that it would be gone in a day or two. But I think Harry took it personally when he asked to be let outdoors and the wet white glop was back again.
And now another weekend is upon us, and for the third straight in a row, we’ve got bare ground and moderating temperatures. Harry has even gone outside TWICE today, probably thinking that he’d better get it in before he gets snowed on again. I don’t blame him, but I also can’t say with 100% certainty that this time he’s wrong, even though the forecast is in our favor. Only Monday morning will tell him for sure.
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