I finished reading North to the Night by Alvah Simon, which I mentioned a few posts ago. With his boat trapped in the ice, the author spent a beautiful and terrifying winter alone in the Arctic. He wasn't completely alone, though: he had a cat to keep him company. At one point during the long and lonely polar night, he penned this poem about his cat, named Halifax:
Halifax, my cat, was furry and fat.
Oh, a finer companion could not be.
I was trapped in the Arctic,
My life was so stark it
Had no other warm company.
And so side by side,
the dark months we did bide,
Huddled as bleak blizzards blew.
And when the food ran out,
At eight pounds thereabout,
she made a fine and filling meat stew.
Ha! The ending is pretty good, but overall I still like Data's poem better. Don't worry, though, he didn't really eat the cat.
The cat, in fact, saved him from being eaten by a polar bear on numerous occasions. Whenever he wanted to leave his boat, Halifax "would sit on the top companionway step for up to a half hour just listening. She would turn her little head steadily like a radar interpreting signals too subtle for my muted human senses. If she returned to the bottom of the sleeping bag, then so would I. The next day I would find signs of the bear's ambush site next to the boat."
I spent a few minutes searching the web for the latest news on the author. I learned that in 2009, nearly 15 years after the Arctic adventure, Halifax the cat passed away. The author wrote a touching good-bye article here.
The book was fascinating. I recommend it.