There’s a kiosk in our bedroom. Two, actually. They’re identical – rich, chocolatey wood with tapered legs that aspire to the mid-century modern style. We call one of them ‘the second location’. In case it hasn’t become clear by now, these kiosks are bedside tables. Their proprietor? Our black-and-white cat, Bella. Attending to the kiosks is part of her nightly routine: as we’re slipping under the covers, she loafs under one of the tables as though she’s serving a queue of clientele in line to buy sweets and magazines.
When you share your home with an animal, it splits into another dimension. There is the layer of the house that caters to our human habits, and the layer that has, since we drove her home from the airport almost four years ago, become entirely Bella’s domain. The basket full of yarn that is, of course, a bed; the kitchen counter that acts as a vantage point from which she can follow the movements of her nemesis; the hallway rug, doubling as both an inconvenient place to lie and equally inconvenient surface upon which to hurl her breakfast if she’s ingested a bit too much grass.
But where these lines between our world and Bella’s are etched into the blueprint of our shared home, they are also almost imperceptible – and what would this house be without Bella?
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I wasn’t someone who grew up with pets. Instead, from my early twenties, they have come to me – a parade of animals in need of somewhere to live through circumstance or fate.
First, there was Hercules: a senior black-and-white cat we took in through our vet-nurse friend. Hercules added his adorably cranky old-man vibes to our first three flats together. He loved nothing more than loafing on the arm of the sofa or sleeping so close to a radiator he once singed his fur. He lived nearly twenty years. On the morning of the day he died, he cuddled up to me in bed as if he somehow knew. We scattered his ashes in a stream at our local park, somewhere he’d never ventured as an indoor cat, but probably would have loved. Bella was next, again through our friend at the vets’ by way of her first human mother, my sister. Having a cat in our home again filled an emptiness only those who’ve lived with, and lost, animals will know.
Cats are felt as a soft presence in the room they are in; the comfort of knowing they are somewhere, probably curled up asleep, in a spot they have taken a liking to. Before I romanticise any further: only Bella has made of the tangle of cables behind the TV a site of mischief. Sounding the chirpy meow she reserves solely for intentional wrongdoing, she slips behind the unit and clambers about, revelling in our shouts of protestation. The function of this particular piece of furniture holds no weight in her world.
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Our most recent animal companions came to us through a local friend with two mini-lop rabbits in need of rehoming. Doris and Niklas have lived their long lives outside, and it doesn’t feel right to me to change that, so we get to work on building them a safe and cosy enclosure in the garden. I spend hours reading animal charity websites and sifting through conflicting information elsewhere. I spend hours sitting on the porch steps, supervising the rabbits as they play and rest in their temporary pen. The garden is the largest room of our house and Doris and Niklas have brought it to life in a new and wonderful way. Every morning, I clear the tiny, spherical droppings out of their hutch, collecting them in an old plastic box to one day be used to nourish the soil we’ll grow in.
But I worry. A lot. I sleep like shit the first week, waking in the middle of the night with all manner of concern circling around and around in my mind. One morning, I go to check on the rabbits at five a.m. It’s the earliest I’ve ever been outside the house. They are absolutely fine, as far as I can tell, snoozing side by side in the hutch that I painted the same red and white as our home.
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People have very strong opinions on the ethics of where domesticated animals should and shouldn’t be housed, or given access to. Animals kept inside are sheltered from diseases, predators and cars – but kept further away from enacting their natural behaviours in a natural environment. Predatory pets, like cats, undeniably impact bird populations; the numbers, if you dare to look them up, are quite staggering (though it’s worth noting that the bulk of the havoc is thought to be caused by feral animals). Having spent most of her life inside, Bella is not the most skilled of hunters – I can count on two hands the creatures she’s killed or maimed over the last three years. We limit her outside time during fledgling season and spring, and never let her out at dawn or overnight. We monitor her movements outdoors, disrupting any activity that looks like it might lead to the death of another being. Her reaction to this is one of great irritation, and I can’t help but feel a little guilty for imposing my human sensibilities on her animal instincts.
I don’t know what the answer is, but the question leads down a long, long road to the roots of animal domestication, and even murkier questions therein. Googling mini lops, I find that they’ve been recognised as a breed just a bit longer than I’ve been alive. There’s something Frankensteinian about the creation of breeds of domesticated animals, the favouring of certain characteristics and traits to the detriment of the animals’ health. Meanwhile, their wild counterparts are viewed as pests and disruptors. Myxomatosis, a fatal disease affecting rabbits all over the world, has been used in the past to control populations. In France, it was deliberately introduced by a physician to eradicate wild rabbits that roamed his estate – the virus consequently spread across Europe, and even to Ireland and the U.K.
Domesticated animals have enriched my life, and the lives of many millions, with company and comfort. They embed themselves into our routines and homes, into the very plans we have for where and how we want to live. A world without pets would be a terribly lonely one – but guardianship of non-human animals is not without its moral grey zones.
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In hotels, Bella’s absence is strongly felt. My mind has a way of replacing her in the lines of my vision – a pair of shoes, a bag, even a shadow of the right shape and size might masquerade as her to eyes that want to see what they want to see. At home, I notice even the slightest change to her routine, and feel each adjustment with total fascination. She’s decided to sleep on a kitchen chair, or snoozed on my side of the bed until midday? That Bella might make a choice as to where she’d prefer to cat today is somehow the cutest, most precious thing ever to happen.
Doris and Niklas are not the cuddliest of bunnies. As prey animals, they don’t like to be handled – a boundary I must respect. As I watch them, their individual personalities emerge. I learn how they relate to each other and their home, see how they look out for one another in that very special way that bonded rabbits do. Of course, it is not just our homes that open up new dimensions when we share them with non-human animals. It is our hearts, too, that find new avenues for caring and loving, new rooms to fill up.
My short story collection, Tools For Surviving A Storm, is out now.
‘In a transporting, original collection, Nadia Henderson examines the lines between nature and the human world through stories set in landscapes both brutal and beautiful.’
I’m Nadia, a London-born writer living and working in rural Sweden. I write short stories, creative non-fiction and, of course, newsletters. If you like, you can find out more about me and my work on my website. Thank you for reading Home Comforts!
A beautiful piece of writing as always. Love your description of how animals take up subconscious space, how we expect to see them in our peripheral vision even when they're not there. I find that with their sounds too - after we lost our last dog I expected to hear the patter of his feet on the kitchen floor, such a strong expectation becomes almost a certainty, so you're convinced you've heard it/seen them even when you haven't. Kudos on using the opportunity to delve into the murky area of the ethics of domestication. And the line "the chirpy meow she reserves solely for intentional wrongdoing"... so accurate! 😅 I love your blog posts; whenever a new one drops I stop what I'm doing to read it... the digital equivalent to 5 mins with a cosy blanket and a hot drink, moments to savour these days!