Runcible Cat: A brief biography.

       I have been told that in publishing a blog, especially under a pseudonym, one is expected to provide a modicum of information—therefore I, Runcible Cat, will now disclose all.

From my earliest kittenhood, I remember that we lived in a spacious old Victorian house, with kindly and attentive humans, and a lot of leftover tuna casserole. We were allowed out into the garden, and it was a wonderful garden, with interesting little beetles to eat, or at least to pounce on, and flower beds of all kinds to dig up. And one of the humans kept pigeons, and that was our undoing. The humans did not seem to mind my father chasing the pigeons; they thought it was funny. You see, my father, being old and arthritic could not actually catch pigeons. So his feeble attempts were a source of amusement. But one Sunday morning, while being an unusually competent cat, or perhaps in pursuit of an unusually incompetent pigeon, he actually caught one—and ate it. And I believe that is how we came to lose our “situation.” That was our original sin which occasioned our fall from grace and our expulsion from the garden—and even worse, our expulsion from the house.

I’m not sure where my litter-mates ended up, but I was sent to live with Aunt Lulu and my eccentric Uncle Thomas, who spent his last years investigating the operation of can openers. After Uncle Thomas died, Aunt Lulu lived on for many years. She was a very popular kitty, and always seemed to be having kittens, but few ever survived kittenhood. There were drowning accidents mostly, always in the same pond. Aunt Lulu would explain, “I tried to tell them, ‘If you’re going to play inside a burlap bag, then be very careful not to play too near the water. But you know how kittens are these days—they just won’t listen.’”

I’m now a very old kitty. For hobbies, I’ve tried knitting, but whenever I see a ball of yarn, I just want to play with it--but you probably all have that problem. For my preferred reading, my favorite Bible story is the one about the five loaves and two fishes. I especially like the part about the fishes. And I belong to a choral society. The other cats, all sturdy yeeoowmen, think we should learn some Maori songs.

Yet I have my fantasies. Sometimes, when I’ve had a bit too much catnip, I imagine that I am a human—some old white guy living in some incredibly bucolic rural part of northeast Iowa. This old guy, as I imagine him, was born about 1939. Being born in the Roosevelt administration and growing up in the Truman administration, his political attitudes stand out as radical left-wing populism in most circles today.

But he never thinks of himself in that light. You see, the ideas he believes in--that everyone has a right to a secure job that pays a living wage, and the right to union representation if they want it, and the right to basic medical care, and to a decent education, and to a place to live—these ideas were at one time considered absolutely mainstream in America, and he still remembers that time. He even remembers when trade policies were aimed at improving the lives of the working class—not the investing class. And he hopes to live to see some of these ideas become mainstream again.

As I imagine him, he grew up in an industrial town in the Midwest, the 3rd son of 2nd generation immigrant parents. When in high school, his plan was to join the Navy and then go to college on the GI bill, as his elder brother had done. He had hoped to be an engineer or a science teacher. But when the Eisenhower administration ended the GI bill in 1956, but did not end the draft, he had no “plan B.” He tried to work his way through college by alternately working in the local factories a semester, then going to college a semester. I think he declared a double major of physics and economics and enrolled at UNI, then called Iowa State Teachers’ College. But after two years of college, he was twenty-two, and when he quit school that year to look for another job, he lost his student deferment and was drafted.

Naturally, he enlisted for an additional year so as to qualify for a better school. He was sent to the U.S. Army Signal School in New Jersey, then arguably the best electronic tech school in the world. He spent the last few months of his tour of duty in Viet Nam, but never saw any combat. He was part of a team of electronics experts, sent in to install a portable ground station for the world’s first geo-synchronous communications satellite. When discharged, he was 26, still had only two years of college, and there was still no GI Bill. Having few options, he tried to market the technical skills the Army had given him, eventually becoming an IBEW electrician doing heavy industrial work. Finding this work more interesting and rewarding on several levels than he had ever imagined, he remained at the trade nearly 40 years, wiring factories, power houses, refineries, etc. But to remain employed, he often worked hundreds of miles from home, leaving his wife and child at home.

Now retired, this burned out old electrician has been happily married to the same woman for nearly forty years. They have one adult daughter, now gainfully employed in some abstruse technical field. He subscribes to a dozen periodicals including Nation, The American Prospect, In These Times, Dollars & Sense, and Wall Street Journal. (Why WSJ? Sometimes their news pages contain investigative pieces not covered by anyone else.) His activism extends to the environment, alternative energy, and social and economic justice. His musical tastes are eclectic, including opera, bluegrass, blues, Cajon, klezmer, and many other styles. Being a persistent autodidact, he reads almost entirely non-fiction, usually economics, science, history, or archaeology. And he and his wife do extensive gardening.

Since I, the Runcible Cat, enjoy pretending to be this old guy, please let me enjoy my fantasies. Without them, what would I have left? So if in my postings I assume the voice of some old guy in rural Iowa, just indulge me--please.