Dear Otus,
My neighbor, Monroe, has got to be your biggest fan. He tells me he has read every single one of your columns since the very first one. If I heard him correctly, that's an astonishing 35 years' worth. I can't imagine.
I'm embarrassed to say I only started the paper a couple of months ago when I got tired of what passes for "news" on cable TV. Therefore, I missed out on your early years when I was just a kid.
It would be a service to your old fans and new readers if you could rerun that very first column. I, personally, would find it fascinating from a historical perspective.
-- Alfred Schwarzlose,
Kingsland
Dear Alfred,
It was wholly a pleasure to hear from you and a further pleasure to grant your request.
As it so happens, I will be on special assignment this week and next and that's the perfect time to run "best of" columns.
Caveat lector: In no way is the very first Head Cat column among my best. Or even among the mediocre. In fact, that first column was pretty much a last-minute filler for the paper's new Omnibust page.
The page would eventually evolve into today's Voices page, but in the beginning it was hard to find contributors to a page dedicated to humor and satire.
As you'll read below, there was some uncertainty as to whether there even would be a second column. As it turns out, then-Managing Editor John R. Starr was thrilled with the initial effort, especially after he got a letter that said, "I can't believe you killed trees to print this junk."
Next week I'll reprint a column from September 1980. Meanwhile here, in the name of nostalgia, is the very first Otus the Head Cat column. It ran on April 1, 1980, under the headline, "High Order of Head Cat serious stuff."
•••
Well, here I am, Arkansas.
Otus is the name and Head Cat's the game. It's not a game, really. The Great Cat (we call him Kalaka) takes this Head Cat stuff seriously.
Kalaka told me that I was born a Head Cat. Some achieve Headcatness, while others have Headcatness thrust upon them.
I was born in a cardboard box beneath a mobile home in Fayetteville on March 6, 1975. My mother (her name was Tai Roo) was a delicate Siamese beauty in her prime.
Dad (his name was Oscar) was a fly-by-night ne'er-do-well. One cold night, he got up on the edge of the box, announced that he was "confused" and complained that he had never savored life's great adventures.
Whereupon he headed for Texas, leaving behind me, Mom and six bewildered siblings.
The Great Cat is a Presbyterian (as are all thinking cats), and therefore allowed our predestiny to take over -- we all got new owners. I was worried for a time, because I was the last to go. But it was a Head Cat test.
After my brothers and sisters had gone, the Great Cat revealed my destiny. He also sent my fleas, Felicia and Fred, who live on the tip of my tail.
So, I finally got an owner, and a secondhand one at that. My owner had first taken my brother Nit-Noi, but Nit-Noi was sickly and died. I inherited his litter box.
During the next year, I took training as an apprentice Head Cat. The course is rough; its standards are the highest. The emphasis is on logic and the liberal arts.
In addition, you learn the 127 cat napping positions, the three phases of nonchalant knickknack breaking, the high C peeve meow, basic rodent catching (I specialized in field mice) and finally, window sill sitting in the downward cat yoga position.
If we master all this, the Great Cat turns us loose to think sage thoughts, advise and counsel.
Some of the thoughts we must think are real puzzlers. Will Jimmy Carter be re-elected? Should he be? Why does Gov. Clinton only own a dog? Will Charlie's Angels be renewed?
It took a year, but I successfully passed the course and here I am with my family. Besides Owner, there is Grendel the Border Dog, who, lacking sheep, tries to herd the rest of us around the house.
There are also the tabbies, Gizmo and Frodo, who are proof that all cats are not created equal.
Don't get me wrong, I love Gizmo and Frodo, but they have the attention spans of lima beans. Owner got them the time I left home for a week for my graduation pilgrimage and a sniper with a BB gun got me. I still carry the pellet, but that's another story.
I've got to go now. Owner is wadding up a paper ball for me to chase down the hall. I can't resist that. I love it almost as much as I love licking toes.
If I'm in the mood to type (it's very hard, even for a Head Cat), you'll be hearing from me again. If I'm not, may Kalaka be with you.
Disclaimer
Fayetteville-born Otus the Head Cat's award-winning column of
humorous fabrication
appears every Saturday. Email:
mstorey@arkansasonline.com
HomeStyle on 06/27/2015