Here, kitty, kitty....kitty!

"Here, kitty, kitty...kitty"

The following letter was written during the summer of 2008 when Frances Sawyer, a friend for over 40 years, and the sister of my best friend, Phil Johnson, asked me to send her one of my stories from the days when Phil and I were both single and ran around together. Frances put together a book of memories for Phil, on the occasion of his 60th birthday party in Knoxville, TN, and I was honored to have the opportunity to tell about a funny time from our past.

A word of explanation: Phil and I had nicknames for each other. We weren’t, and aren’t very imaginative people, and the origin of the nicknames is lost in the ‘mists of time’, but we have, for over 40 years, referred to each other as ‘hack’…or ‘hacker’…or ‘hackeroo’. Lesser forms of the word also included ‘hackeroosky’ and the even less common ‘hackerola’. We also tagged other friends with these dubious nicknames. I assure you, they are worthy recipients of the grand name. You may know Randy and Tommy Heath, or Bobby Rowley. To this day they respond well to any of the different forms of the name ‘hack’, and the use of one of these names will invariably bring a smile to their faces! Since I am incapable of continuing with the etymology of the word ‘hack’, I’ll get right to the story….


Hey, Hack!

So, you’re hitting the big 6-0! (Oh, to be 60 again!). It seems like just the other day….we were both single, and it was likely a Friday night, about midnight. We usually met over at your little rent house on Rhode Island, in Edmond – a place we both called ‘Roach Haven’. It was a tiny cinderblock place that you temporarily called ‘home’. After our Friday and Saturday night dates with beautiful young women at OCC, we often met at your place to unwind and talk about the wonderful evenings we had just enjoyed with our dates. Ah, those were the days!

One particular evening, we were sitting on stiff-backed chairs at Roach Haven, with our feet off the floor, and both of us wielding fly swatters. You’ll remember that our feet had to be kept off of the floor to avoid getting in the way of hordes of strange insects that were constantly marching across your floor. The flyswatters were used to ‘bat’ out of the air, some of the flies, mosquitoes, moths and wasps that were in abundance. Due to the unbelievable quantity of insects, there was also a corresponding and amazing variety of spiders, which had also taken up residence in Roach Haven, and which fed on the smorgasbord of bugs.

Sometime well after midnight, while we were still regaling each other with unforgettable stories, we noticed the rather insistent ‘meowing’ of a cat. Although we tried to ignore it, the howling persisted until we got a little bit annoyed. We went ‘outside’ (which was just like the ‘inside’, but with trees, cars and the mailbox). We picked up some pieces of bricks, and started softly calling ‘Here, kitty-kitty….here, kitty, kitty!’ The ‘kitty’ was persistent with the howling, but elusive. We started throwing rocks and pieces of bricks, and, when that didn’t work, began lobbing full-sized bricks at the source of the noise. The cat did not let up, and the howling got louder and louder. We then noticed that the cat’s howling was now coming from high up in a cedar tree in your front yard. We started heaving bricks up into the tree. The cat climbed higher. We now viewed the cat problem as a challenge! You picked up a large glass bottle from the yard and threw it with all your strength, high into the tree. You missed, but the bottle found its mark, on a neighbor’s steel fence post, and shattered into a thousand pieces! Enraged, you leaped into the tree, and climbed maybe fifteen feet up the tree. When you reached for the cat, you were met with a very loud ‘ROWWWRRRRR!’…and a near-miss from the cat’s lightning fast, slashing attempt at ripping your face off! Suddenly you almost flew out of the tree—panic and fear in your voice as you fell to the ground, tree limbs all-a-breaking! I was safely on the ground, laughing so hard that I had trouble breathing! My laughing at you, and the cat’s vicious decimation of your ‘bravery’ made you only madder. You ran into Roach Haven and grabbed your ubiquitous green Army jacket (you remember the one…the one that you were wearing in all photographs taken of you for twenty-plus years). You wrapped the green jacket around your ‘Lion-Taming Arm’ and, with something of a John Wayne swagger and set to your jaw, headed back up the tree. (Stay with me here…it gets better!).
I wish I had a picture of you, heading up that tree, with the kitty howling and YOU saying some very, very unkind things to – and about – the poor little ‘kitty’. I didn’t want to miss out on any of the action (or your demise). I was standing more or less directly under you and the cat. When you got near the cat, you grabbed the cedar tree and started waving it and the cat back and forth with vigor borne of rage! Again, the spectacle had me roaring with laughter, and I tried to ‘egg on’ both you and the kitty, to prolong the fun. This was beginning to be a LOT of fun!

Suddenly, the cat got sick…at both ends…simultaneously. I was looking up at you and the cat and never even saw what hit me square on top of my head, but, from the smell and semi-liquid nature of it, I knew what had happened. In a tenth of a second, in abject horror I yelled ‘AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! …and ran into Roach Haven, heading for the bathtub. I yanked on the screen door so violently that I tore it off of the hinges. I rushed into the bathroom, stuck my head into the bathtub and began trying to clean the CATastrophe off of my head! I used a lot of bar soap and shampoo, and a number of available bathroom cleansers – Lysol, Comet cleanser, among others -- in a vain attempt at ridding my head of the smell and the mess. During my discomfort, you climbed down from the tree and came indoors, and all I could hear, over the roar of the water in the bathtub, was your convulsive laughter.

Later on, sometime after 2 a.m., after we had exhausted all the jokes at each others’ expense, we went back outside, loaded up with bricks, as before, but this time, the quiet calls of ‘Kitty-Kitty, were much lower in pitch and very ominous as we once again called out quietly in our best Marlon Brando-ish Godfather voices: ‘HERE, KITTY, KITTY,…. HERE, KITTY….KITTY…KITTY…KITTY.’ We did not find the cat this time, but, as we searched the area around the front of Roach Haven we noticed that the street in front of your home was sprinkled with dozens of large rocks, bricks and pieces of bricks…it looked like a war zone.

Phil, I don’t remember the names of the girls we were dating back then, but I won’t EVER forget the ‘NIGHT OF THE CAT’. We’ve been buddies since about 1967, and I have never had a better friend. This is one of a thousand stories each of us could tell about the great times we have shared as friends.

Thanks for being my friend, Phil. You are the best buddy I have ever had and we have waded into and through a lot of the best that life has to offer. I treasure your friendship!

I love you, ‘Hack’!


Gene Shoemake
Edmond, Oklahoma