Ариель Абарбанель - Philosophical adventures of kitten Roll

A six-year-old girl named Erica lived in a German city, and she had a Roll. That was the name of the kitten. He was fluffy and gray, and knew how to rumble. Maybe that's why Roll?

Roll and the girl lived very well together. The girl gave the kitten sausage and fish, and the kitten licked the girl's hands and purred sweetly. And of course, the kitten loved balls. And not only – also grandmother's balls, dad's pencils and pens, mom's curlers. Everything that rolled, jumped and jumped – after all, he was a kitten.

One day Roll could not play. What happened? Claws interfered. They grew up a lot and did not allow walking and jumping. Roll was taken away from mom early and he didn’t know how to sharpen his claws, but he tried it anyway. Grandmother, seeing that the kitten was spoiling the carpet, gave him a newspaper rolled into a tube. Roll got upset and went out into the street.

There was a large anthill on the street, and ants lived there. They saw Roll, were delighted with him, climbed into his fur and began to roll off him, like a slide. But Roll was still sad.

– What's the matter? the ants asked. Roll told them it was the claws.

– ABOUT! Give them to us! said the ants.

– What for? – Roll was surprised.

– We will make sabers out of them!

– Yes, please take it! – agreed Roll.

The ants beautifully sawed off Roll's claws so that he could jump and play again, and they made beautiful, silver, curved, Turkish-like sabers for themselves. They walked around the courtyard like black little soldiers, and greeted Roll and the others in the house, gaily swinging their shiny sabers.

And Roll, having calmed down, was able to return to the house, lie down on a warm radiator, curl up into a ball, lick his paws and sleep peacefully.

And he had a good dream, how ants in black uniforms walked in an even formation with crooked sabers raised up and their small legs in shiny boots were beating fractionally along the pavement: knock-knock, top-top, knock-knock.

The kitten was very small. So small that he didn't jump on cabinets, tables, or even chairs. He ran on the floor, on the parquet, ran, rolled, slid, tumbled. Well, in general, it was not for nothing that they gave him the name – Roll.

Grandmother is a neat hostess, but still not always and not everywhere she will get a mop and a broom. Where the broom did not reach, I took out the kitten. He himself is gray, suddenly appeared from under the chest of drawers even more gray, if I may say so, gray from dust and even clumps of dust hung from his mustache.

Everything that was “under” was a separate world. Anything could be found in this world – pencils, hairpins, candy, spools, delicious pieces of cookies. The kitten found all these objects, was very happy, examined them and played with delight. I rolled coils, ate cookies, pushed pencils. In general, it was not boring, but it was great.

Once, in such a semi-gloomy search, his wet nose came across a mink.

– I wonder what's there? – Curiosity pushed the nose further and further. Now the "mink" sits tightly on the ears, but in the mink itself, it turned out there was nothing, no mouse, no sausages.

Roll backed away – backed up, but no results, “it” continued to sit firmly on his ears. Kitty this way and that, back and forth, top and side – the head continued to remain covered and warm. Yes, warm – now the kitten felt that what was sitting on his head not only interfered and annoyed, but also warmed! And it was pleasantly warm! All children know that cold air is below, and warm air is above. Roll, since he was down all the time, was blown by cold air. And Roll is small – the ears and tail were freezing.

– Oh, you honey! – He heard grandmother's voice. – What's on your ears? – Grandma's hands picked up and raised the kitten to the level of the lamp. Two eyes enlarged with thick lenses studied the kitten, looked at him point-blank.

– What a cute hat! My darling! Who dressed you up like that? What tenderness, look, Erica – she turned to her granddaughter.

– Lovely, lovely, – the girl clapped her hands, jumped and, picking up the kitten, whirled around the room with him.

– A kitten in a hat! A kitten with warm ears, – she sang.

Grandmother pointed her lenses at Roll again:

– What is it, after all? – she froze in thought and, suddenly, smiling, spread her arms to the sides:

– How, – she slapped her forehead with her palm – this is a sock. That sock that I knitted so many years ago for my grandson, your nephew Brahm. I was looking for him so much then, I kept thinking where he could go. Found, – the grandmother spread in a smile. You see, my girl, – she put her warm, wrinkled hand on Erica's head, – nothing and never, no work is wasted. Heats his ears.

Roll looked first at the grandmother, then at the girl. It understood that grandmother was saying something wise, important, not quite understood that. But the main thing was that the head was wrapped in a sock-cap, in which it was so warm.

Roll had a fluffy thick coat. And since he was still a little kitten, like all little ones, he loved to run, tinker and roll on the floor. The house where he lived was large, and the hostess did not always have time to clean it – dust collected from time to time. It was in this dust that Roll was enveloped like a Kolobok in flour. The grandmother did not have time to comb the kitten – this was Erica's responsibility. She took a brush, put the kitten on her lap on the back and scratched it. Sometimes Roll liked it, sometimes not – then he turned and tried to run away.

The girl was combing the kitten on the street and, doing it contrary to her grandmother's prohibition, let the kitten's fur fly through the air – since it happened in the yard. The wind lifted the pieces of fluff upward, circling it like flakes of snow. Some of them sat on tree branches and grass, while others continued to carry the irrepressible wind, and the girl loved this game. She threw back her head and looked at the whirlpool, at the whirling of fluff and the whims of the wind.

In the end, either the wind got tired and the fluffy snowflakes scattered in all directions, or the wind grew stronger and went away for a walk, taking most of the fluff with it.

Then the girl, sighing about the end of the show, went home. And at home her beloved grandmother, warm tea and a playful kitten were waiting. Combed out and contented, he jumped up on the girl's lap and hummed peacefully. The yellow light of the lamp burned, grandmother was reading a fairy tale, it was warm, joyful and very cozy.

Roll lay full on cozy sofas, his loving mistress Erica was pleasantly scratching behind his ear, and he reasoned that these creatures were strange people. For example, Frida – her name means "peaceful", and from her nothing but scandals and riots. Or black dogs are often called Zorro, although Zorro in Spanish is a fox, and after all, foxes are mostly red.

Roll, although he was a small kitten, but very well-read. All because he was more silent and watched everything and thought. No wonder that in Holland, where they recently moved from Germany, there was a saying “to look out of the tree like a cat”, which means to be careful, attentive, unhurried and reasonable. Roll tried to be like that.

Roll also loved to lie by the window and watch the events taking place. Moreover, in this Lowland, as the name of the Kingdom of the Netherlands was translated, it rained very often and the most reasonable thing, of course, was to be where it remained dry and warm.

And so, on rainy days, the kitten lay on the radiator and looked at the creeping drops on the glass. In front of him, people sometimes humorously minced, hunched over under an umbrella – and everyone was in a hurry. And Roll was in no hurry. He often fell into a sweet slumber, and when he woke up, the picture changed: either a flock of chirping gray birds flew, then a white cloud appeared in the clearing sky, like a castle made of sour cream. Thinking about sour cream returned Roll to reality, and he jumped off the windowsill, went to his bowl and refreshed himself with appetite. And when Erica came home from school or her grandmother came back from the market, they would certainly take the cat in her arms, scratching her tummy and back. The girl or grandmother was reading some book at that time, and the kitten, under the rustle of pages, studied letters and words with interest, and it even began to seem to him that he, too, could already read. This is how the kitten learned about life and the world.

The Chariot of the Seasons swept through the hot months and smoothly passed into a calmer and cooler period: autumn came. The trees were quietly parting with leaves that were now unnecessary. At parting they played with them, launching them like kites, and they soared for a long time in the air. From the yellow-red, now completely joyfully colored leaves, a fluffy rustling carpet was formed, like a mosaic, chaotic and logical in its chaos. Sometimes a fractional rain dabbled with thrown leaves, sometimes a mischievous wind amused, scattering them and re-creating new patterns.

As the leaves flew from the trees, so did the wool from the Roll. He also had autumn, a cat autumn called molt. Fortunately, cat autumn is not the same as that of trees – it does not strip cats and cats naked, but only adds flying fluff to the flying leaves. Roll liked autumn. He liked those rustling, rustling leaves. He was delighted when they jumped from the trees, and Roll jumped to them and caught them: curled up in a ball, rolled in this whole heap, grabbed, caught leaves, and more and more flew towards him. Autumn is a very good time of the year.

Then, when autumn began to grow up, and then grow old, she more and more often cried about her curly motley leaves, about the birds that had flown away to distant countries, who sang such wonderful songs to her, about the old days. Roll the kitten did not want such profuse and cold tears, from which he became completely wet. He sat at home. Since they did not have a stove in their house, he chose a TV instead of a stove, on which he now lay from lunch to dinner.

In addition to the fact that some kind of warmth emanated from this hefty box, it had many other useful and pleasant properties. For example, the TV box hummed pleasantly and reminded Roll of a purring mother. From this buzz I found such a pleasant languor that I wanted to sleep and sleep. But the nicest thing about the TV was that Roll was almost never alone. Always someone came, sat down opposite and looked in the direction of the cat. And this is very nice to know that you are not alone, even when you sleep!

People came, sat down and looked in the direction of Roll, and Roll with one half-open eye looked at them. Cats usually keep an eye on what is happening around them, even when they sleep. Sometimes, usually in the morning, my grandmother came, in the afternoon – the neighbors, and in the evening, after school – Erica, sometimes alone, and sometimes with her friends. Roll didn’t understand, but it was very funny to him that the TV always behaved the same: it hummed equally comfortably, warmed it equally, stood in the same place calmly. But people! Oh, these people! They were crying, then laughing, then suddenly jumping up from their seats, shouting and clapping their hands. And all this – looking into the warm box on which Roll was lying. Roll could only look at the mouse for so long. But, in the end, he jumped on it and most often ate it. And people did not eat TV. But Roll ate – no, not a warm-humming TV. Not. He ate sour cream. I ate sausages. I ate everything from the table that my grandmother left on it, leaving to sit in front of this mysterious box. These were safe and delicious meals. It is not for nothing that Roll is a born hunter and a relative, albeit distant, to such hunters as a lion and a tiger. And what could be more pleasant than an evening and calm hunt on grandmother's table?