Okay, but now we have another question that remains frustratingly ambiguous.
Why was the original question posed? The answer was both obvious and easily obtained via simple web search.
As I try to sleep tonight, I feel that this will deeply bother me, and perhaps even infect my dreams. As though there is something deeper occurring in layers of social nets to which I'm not privy. I myself did a simple Google search and confirmed my own suspicion, but now I begin to question the fact that it was a suspicion to begin with.
When I was 12 years old, my mother and I traveled to the north of the state of Michigan for a vacation. We stayed in a small cottage near a lake. We'd taken our cat Tatsuka to stay with my grandmother during our sojourn, and we spent ten days beside the lake sunning, swimming, and riding the boats one could rent at the shore.
I met a girl there, and though we never fell in love, I'm certain that she existed. She'd come up to the cottage one evening and had dinner with us, my mother and I, and she brought a fish she'd caught from the lake. I think her name was Claire.
On the seventh day of our vacation, my grandmother called the cottage. My mother was out on the floating dock reading, so I ansered.
"Tatsuka is missing," said my grandmother. You should come home soon.
When my mother and I returned home, Tatsuka was on our front porch, sunning and looking none the worse for wear. He'd crossed several miles of hazardous territory and large river to flee from his captivity at my grandmother's house, and had set up peacefully outside his own home.
He greeted us with a "mert". He seemed happy to see us, I guess. He was certainly happy to hear the sound of the cat food can opening.
I've gone on to a succesful career in manufacturing... 23 years have passed and I've made some solid friendships with respected colleagues, married and have three children. There have been ups and downs as one might expect in such cases.
But the question plagues me now as I write this. As it most likely always will. How did Tatsuki make his way home? Perhaps more importantly, why?
New construction, more space, more of everything... it strikes me as mysterious. A missing cat, a girl with a fish. An earthquake?
Motion without moving.