Tip and Teddy

When I reminisce about all the animals our family has had over the years, I always think of Tip and Teddy. They were gray tabbies, sisters from the same litter, that we adopted when we lived in a townhouse in Springfield, Virginia. We had just moved from Watertown, Massachusetts, where, as renters, we were not allowed to have pets. My three sons really wanted to have pets and we discovered that a neighbor a few doors down was looking to give away some kittens. Tip and Teddy were the last two to be chosen because, unknown to their parents, the neighbor’s children would always tell anyone who came to look at them that they were already taken. In spite of the fact that they were both female, we named one of them after Tip O’Neil (since we had just moved from Massachusetts) and to “balance the ticket” we picked a Republican, Teddy Roosevelt, as the namesake for her sister. Tip was considered to be the prettier of the pair and always acted ladylike. Tip became my oldest son James’ cat. She could always hear the school bus before any of us and would be patiently waiting at the top of the stairs to greet him when he walked in the door. She would “speak” to him in a manner that always seemed to be her idea of human speech. It almost sounded like ‘hello James, how was your day?’ James just wanted to decompress and we would have to remind him to talk to his cat.

Teddy was my cat. She was mouthy and her nose looked like it was pushed in, giving her a pugnacious appearance. She would sprawl across the floor in a most unladylike road kill pose and would hustle family members for treats, poking us with a paw to try to get a chance to lick the salt off a potato chip or help us finish our ice cream.  We learned that we had to keep doughnuts secured by a rubber band around the box, since we once found a box of a half dozen powdered doughnuts that had been opened and had just the tops of each doughnut nibbled off. Somehow or other, I developed her natural tendency to roll over into a stupid pet trick. She eventually learned to “roll over,” “sit” and “shake hands.” Her other outstanding quality was that she loved to play in the snow. Whenever it snowed, she would sit by a door or window and meow plaintively until someone would let her go outside. She would jump around in the drifts and have fun until she got cold enough to come inside. Tip, on the other hand, would just look at her incredulously. Later, as she got very old, she would still want to go outside in the snow, but would only last a few seconds before she would be crying at the door to come back inside.

We had Tip and Teddy for a very long time. Tip lasted eighteen years before she had to be put down. She was too frail and in too much pain. It was hard for my sons to understand at first, but it was the humane thing to do. Teddy lasted two more years before she too met her sister’s fate. We had them cremated and someday will work out a final resting place for the two sisters who were part of our family for so long.