The Creepy Cat Detective Agency Part IV

The Grand Finale ... or is it?

Dear Kula Diaries,

Welcome to Part IV of The Creepy Cat Detective Agency: The Grand Finale… or is it? I cannot begin to describe the ways in which writing this series of stories has been healing to me. In the Kula Diaries Book Club, we are currently reading The Book of Joy by the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu. A line from that book really stuck with me this past week… “if you are setting out to be joyful you are not going to end up being joyful. You’re going to find yourself turned in on yourself. It’s like a flower. You open, you blossom, really because of other people.” It isn’t the situation that determines how I feel… it’s how I see the situation. I am the lens through which my world creates itself — and I do have the choice, in every single moment, to see things differently. I can choose to see the love that is there, even if it seems concealed at times.

If you have not read parts 1-3 of this story, please read those first, otherwise this will make absolutely zero sense to you. You can find those here:

Creepy Cat Detective Agency - Part One

Creepy Cat Detective Agency - Part Two

Creepy Cat Detective Agency - Part Three

I hope that, in some small way, this story — even though its ‘hero’ is a Victorian Pajama Clad Cat, has opened you up to a new blossoming.

And so, without further adieu… let’s begin where we left off in part III (indicated below in italics), and then watch the rest of the story unfold.

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I had a feeling we weren’t quite done yet… I had seen enough movies to know that reflecting on the past and observing the present wasn’t going to be enough. I knew that we needed to look beyond ourselves a bit more… and I was starting to feel hopeful that something really beautiful was going to be on the other side. I looked at the Cat for instructions, “So what’s next in the investigation? Are you ready to hit the road?”

The Cat turned away from the window and looked deeply into my eyes, “Roads?” The Cat paused for what I can only assume was dramatic effect… “Where we’re going, we don’t need roads.”

When I opened my eyes, I was standing directly in the middle of a road. “I thought you said there weren’t any roads?”, I asked the Cat, feeling confused.

The Cat’s voice echoed in my mind, “Oh, that’s just something I had always wanted to say.”

I shook my head. The Cat was unpredictable, at best. When they had appeared in my office to help me handle a case of fraud and theft, I had been hesitant. The rational part of my brain was screaming, “Do you really think it’s a good idea to hire a telepathic, time-travelling Cat wearing Victorian Pajamas?” But I had to admit, the rational part of my brain was the part that had hired a scam artist as an HR Investigator to begin with. In the midst of trying to do everything right, I had hired one Hagis Scuthins, JD to investigate a theft… and had, myself, become a victim of theft and fraud at the hands of the investigator himself. So far, the Cat’s investigative techniques had taken us back in time… to snoop on some folks in the present… and, naturally, I assumed that the road that I was now standing on was at some point in the future. I looked around and couldn’t tell where we were — the landscape appeared barren, and oddly enough, I couldn’t tell if we were in the desert … or a forest… or surrounded by mountains. It seemed to be a strange road where we were somehow in the middle of nothing and everything all at the same time.

The road in the middle of nowhere and everywhere.

“Are we in the future? Because this looks bleak,” I asked the Cat.

“It’s not the future — it’s hard to explain, but it’s sort of like the space between. It’s a place where everything is possible because you haven’t quite created the future yet. It’s a chance to decide.”

Instinctively, I waved my arm in a zig-zag motion in front of my face and it seemed to disrupt the energy flow of the air — a ripple of light seemed to emerge from a substance that neither existed nor didn’t exist. “This is weird,” I said, in the understatement of the century.

“Well, what’s your decision,” The Cat asked, “Wouldn’t you like a chance to try it out?”

“So, it’s like… I get the chance to see the future… but one that I decide?” I was, understandably confused about how this type of a situation usually worked. The Cat nodded back at me, “Think of it as a test drive. You’re going to get to play a little bit with the play dough of the universe… and see what happens. It’s a unique opportunity… and, unlike a metallic rust orange Honda Fit, you won’t regret testing it.”

I saw a large piece of paper on the ground with a quill pen next to it. When I had started Tiny Spoon Nut Butter, I had purchased a quill pen and wax stamps because I liked taking my time to write letters. Business had always felt so rushed to me… and sealing an envelope with a wax stamp sometimes felt like the only little break that I had in the day. I grabbed the quill pen… dipped it into the ink… and wrote in big letters on the piece of paper:

The Cat held out its toy mouse… and, they were right, we no longer needed the road… because we were right back where we had started. We were back in the Tiny Spoon Nut Butter Factory. Except that… and it was hard for me to tell at first… it felt very, very different. I was standing outside of my office, which appeared to be in disarray. I looked around the factory itself, and noticed that things seemed to be disorganized. I could hear a tense voice coming from within my office, so I peered in to spy on… me. I was on the phone, and I sounded stressed. “Ok, Donna Lou, you know that Dinkleflitzers is our favorite grocery store chain… we need you as a customer… what can I do to make this right? Look, I’m sorry that I forgot about the Butter Bank awards this year… and I’m sorry that I forgot that we were supposed to do that choreographed dance routine together there… that had to have been really awkward to do it alone… especially the ‘turn-turn-kick-turn' part … but, c’mon, you can’t pull Tiny Spoon off the shelf because of one mistake!” I watched as future me hung up the phone and placed my face in my hands… only to be interrupted by yet another call.

Actual footage of Donna Lou’s shocking performance at the Butter Bank Awards. Said one attendee, “It might have made sense if she had a dance partner.”

I could tell immediately that future me was talking to somebody about Hagis. “Ok… so he still hasn’t paid yet? But you’ve located him? What a …. what a load of crock…”. My husband always hated when I said that, but I had to laugh that future me was still saying it. “It doesn’t even make sense,” Aaron would say, as I argued my case that you could indeed physically hold a load of crock. “What else would you hold? A crock of load?” It was a never ending argument that we would likely take to our graves. I looked at the Cat, “This future stuff is pretty realistic and believable.” The Cat smiled without smiling, “Well… it is real. You’re creating it. It isn’t a fake reality. It’s more of… let’s just call it… an option.”

As I watched this future version of me, I was disheartened. Going after Hagis felt like the right thing to do — after all, it felt inherently wrong to let somebody get away with stealing. Hadn’t something been taken from me? Didn’t I have the right to get it back? I couldn’t imagine another way of looking at it — and I couldn’t possibly justify being a victim of theft and fraud. And yet, as I watched this version of me… it was very obvious that she was not happy. She was not joyful. She had lost a grocery store customer because she forgot to attend the Butter Bank awards to perform in a dance routine with Donna Lou from Dinkleflitzers Grocery Store. Was it possible that she was losing more than just the original sum that Hagis had stolen from her? Dinkleflitzers was a $50,000 account… and that was a lot more than Hagis had stolen.

Suddenly, there was a knock at the office door — I could see Lucy standing outside holding a plate of her cinnamon rolls… and a piece of paper with her new logo printed on it. The paper had a handwritten note across the top that said, ‘Business questions to ask Anastasia.’ I felt a renewed sense of pride and confidence — maybe things weren’t going as poorly as I thought they were… after all, Lucy really was pursuing her dream of opening a bake shop. As she stood outside my office waiting, I could hear future me call out from behind a mostly closed door in a tense, annoyed sounding voice, “WHAT IS IT?”. Lucy shuddered and hesitated. I watched as she fumbled with the piece of paper and looked down at the perfect plate of cinnamon rolls. She shook her head and stammered quietly, “Oh… nothing. Sorry to bother you…” And she walked away.

“Noooooo!”, I shouted in slow motion as I watched Lucy retreat down the hall, “How could future me do this?! I’m hurting other people and I don’t even know I’m doing it! I’m so caught up in my own stress and my own stupid hatred about Hagis and that stupid money that I’m missing out on things that I actually care about!” The Cat nodded, “You can only see what you are focused on.” I shook my head in dismay, “And in this situation… I’m focused on anger… and feeling cheated… and wronged….and look what’s happening. Now I’m the one wronging myself and everybody else in the process.”

The Cat seemed to agree, “It’s a bitter pill to swallow.” I nodded back, “It feels like I’m letting Hagis get away with something if I just let it go… but I’m worried that if I don’t let it go, I’ll continue in this downward spiral. Maybe I’m missing the whole point of it.”

The Cat spoke again, “Maybe letting go isn’t what you think it is. Maybe it isn’t letting anybody get away with anything at all.”

I wasn’t sure how this would all work out, but it was very clear to me that jumping into a stressful investigation and subsequent manhunt for Hagis was not going to bring me the closure that I wanted. Sure, it might feel good to ‘get back’ at him, but it also would harm some of the relationships that were the most important to me… and the ripple effect of my decisions would be felt far and wide. Lucy was now walking down the hall in the distance and I watched with sadness and she took her printed logo and plate of cinnamon rolls and dumped them in the trash. “It’s not worth it,” I said, “Not for a few hundred dollars. Not for any dollars.” I had seen enough. “I’m ready to write something else,” I declared as the magical quill pen and paper seemed to materialize in front of me. I grasped the pen in my hand and started to write:

With another touch of the fuzzy toy mouse and another whoosh of the universe… we were gone. As I opened my eyes, I felt a buzzing energy and noticed that we were still in my office, except that this time it was… different. I looked at the nut butter machines and they were churning away — it appeared that we were in full production and I saw employees working hard and pouring mass quantities of sprinkles into giant vats of creamy nut butter. The employees seemed unusually motivated. At first, I couldn’t figure out why there was so much pep in their step… until I saw it. Perched on the edge of the nut butter vat was a small 3D holographic projection of… Christopher Walken. “What in the actual…”, I said. The tiny holographic Christopher Walken gestured his hands wildly as he shouted, in a seemingly never ending loop of enthusiasm, “I’ve got a fever… and the only prescription is MORE SPRINKLES!!!”. The Cat could sense my confusion, “Oh, don’t worry — it says other stuff too. That’s one of your most recent inventions. Pretty brilliant, eh?”.

This was a very different place. As I headed towards my office, I noticed that the miniature 3D holographic Christopher Walken had transformed into a mini holographic Tom Cruise that was jumping up and down on a couch shouting, “I LOVE THIS NUT BUTTER!!”. The door was wide open and felt bright and cheery. I heard the voice of future me, but this time… instead of sounding stressed and irritated… I sounded excited and hopeful. “So the pickle and nut butter collab is launching next week… we’ve designed this custom tiny spoon that has the most perfect hand feel I’ve ever experienced… oh, and Chris from Give ‘Em The Pickle Co. created this custom dill and cinnamon pickle brine for his artisanal pickles and we’re doing a salty pretzel and chocolate chip peanut butter to go with it… we’ve already got 10,000 pre-orders, so we are running around like nuts here… pun intended!” I cringed at my future self’s sense of humor.

I decided to check in on Lucy, since in the other view of my alternate universe, things hadn’t gone so well. I saw her walk into the small conference room, so I snuck in behind her and was shocked at what I saw. Books. And not just any book… but an entire series of books… about a Creepy Cat in Victorian Pajamas. “Is this a joke?”, I said to the Cat. “Afraid not,” the Cat replied, “Just look closer.” I picked up one of the books and opened it. Inside were illustrations, that I recognized immediately as the work of my brilliant Creative Director, Amanda. The story seemed to be following the adventures of a Creepy Cat as they navigated the daily challenges of life — and learned how to look deep within for answers that they had previously searched for outside of themselves. I looked at the front cover:

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I said, “If this is some weird plan of yours to get famous…”

The Cat laughed without laughing, “I definitely don’t want fame. Plus, who would believe you anyway? Are you going to tell people that you hired a Victorian Cat as a Detective? Even I know that nobody would believe that.” I laughed… the Cat had a point. I leafed through the pages and was shocked at the words I had written: poetry, documenting the Cat’s adventures… and a quest to discover the truth about the Universe. “It’s uncanny,” I said, “It’s like this whole experience… that I had initially thought was bad… created an entirely new world of ideas and possibilities!” The Cat stood close to me, “Isn’t it possible that ‘bad’ is just a judgement? Isn’t it possible that if we shift our lens… we can see something that we didn’t realize was there?”

A stack of flyers was lying on the table, and I quickly gazed at them:

“Lucy is starting her baking business!” I felt so proud of her — and while I realized that no single person was responsible for the success of another… I still knew that we were all connected. What we brought into the world in every single moment did interact with the people in our lives and it did affect them. In every single moment, I had a choice: I could be a part of the problem… or a part of the solution. I knew that Hagis was a part of the problem, and I didn’t want to be a part of that anymore. As I held the book signing flyer in my hand, I knew that this was a part of the solution. When I was able to focus my attention beyond what I thought was happening… and into a deeper place… I was able to see things that had been obscured by feelings of hopelessness and despair. I knew that I needed to acknowledge those feelings first… but then, I was learning, it was possible to let them go.

The Cat looked at me as I held the flyer, “Are you ready to go? Have you made a decision?”

I nodded, “I think I know what I have to do.”

“Good,” said the Cat, “Because we have one more place to visit.”

Without hesitating, and without even remotely considering the strangeness of it all, I reached my hand out to meet the fuzzy toy mouse. In a flash, we were in a strange, empty-looking room that oddly made me feel claustrophobic. There were no walls, but it felt very confined… lonely… and desolate. In the middle of the room, sitting in a chair, was none other than Hagis Scuthins, JD… Advocate for Everything. Without the Cat giving me any instructions at all, I knew why I was here. I had to experience forgiveness — and not just my former-Catholic-girl notion of forgiveness. I needed to find real forgiveness.

When I was in 2nd Grade, I received the sacrament of Reconciliation at my Catholic School. I was a student of St. Mary’s School in Wilmington, North Carolina — and I was very nervous to go to confession for the first time. We had been studying for months, but I was nervous that I would forget my ‘lines’ when I approached the priest. And then, a nun pointed at me and indicated that it was my turn for my first Holy Reconciliation. I approached the priest, who was sitting in a special chair so that he was slightly tilted away from me. “Forgive me father, for I have sinned,” I recited from my memory, “This is my first Holy Reconciliation.” The priest said a short blessing and then asked me to state my sins. I frantically tried to search my mind for all of the things that I had done wrong — I was sure that I had messed up, but suddenly, I was worried that I was forgetting something. Wouldn’t God know that I had forgotten to mention it? I was pretty sure that I was doomed before I even had a chance of receiving forgiveness. “I was mean to my sister,” I blurted out, “And I talked back to my parents.” To be honest, I don’t even know if I had done those things — they just seemed like things that a kid my age would have done, so I hoped it was believable. The priest assigned me the task of saying a few Hail Mary’s and Our Father’s… and then, he reported, I would be forgiven. I stood up, shaking. I knew I had dodged a bullet.

My Catholic guilt had haunted me for most of my life — I was very aware of everything that I had done wrong. Shame was a constant companion… and forgiveness was reserved for sins, and usually bestowed upon me by a priest. I had stopped going to confession regularly, because I never wanted to admit to the priest how long it had been since my last one. Were sins compounding? I sure hoped not.

And what about forgiveness of others? Well, that was often seen as a sign of weakness — if I forgave somebody for something, it meant that I let them get away with something bad. If they wanted to be forgiven… they needed to go find their own priest. And yet, as I was now learning … bad was often more complicated than I thought. In fact, it seemed like forgiveness had nothing to do with Hagis… and everything to do with me. Afterall, Hagis hadn’t been the one causing me pain when I sat in my office and talked to my employees in an impatient tone — I had been the one doing that. And when I felt joy — he didn’t create that either. I was the source of what I was feeling. Forgiveness, I now understood, was not about a man with a white beard in the sky giving me a pass on doing something bad. Forgiveness was about letting go of holding onto things that I was using to hurt myself. Forgiveness was learning to see beyond what I thought was happening. Forgiveness was the end of an illusion of lack and scarcity and separateness — and the beginning of seeing what I could not previously see. It was the replacement of all things… with love.

As I approached Hagis, the sympathy odor, which was all too familiar by now, hit my nose with a rancid punch that only a decaying soul can emit. A few days earlier, I would have been angry, but now, I felt something else. I winced, but kept walking towards him. He looked so sad and alone sitting in the chair in the middle of this strange room. “Hagis,” I said, “I’m sorry for the lack you feel about life. I’m sorry for the loneliness you feel. I’m sorry you were bullied. I’m sorry you feel unloved. I know that what I see on the surface isn’t really who you are — I believe there is something more inside you, and I believe that you don’t know it is there. I truly hope you find it someday. For now, I’m going to let you go. I wish you ease… I wish you peace… I wish you happiness… and I wish that you are free from suffering.” I reached my hand out, surprising even myself, to place it on Hagis’ shoulder… and as I did, I watched his image begin to dissolve. I was free. Free from the anger… free from the stress… free from the idea that I had lost anything at all. I closed my eyes and breathed deeply. The sympathy odor was gone — I took big inhales of fresh air, which were now filled with the scent of the forest.

I was jarred from my state of existential bliss by the sound of running footsteps and the excited voice of my husband. “You won’t believe this!”, he shouted, “I found a crock of lode!” He was carrying his laptop and he burst into my office as I tried to orient myself to where I was. He pointed excitedly at the page that was pulled up on his screen, “Look at this! There’s a place that literally sells crocks of lode.” I blinked my eyes furiously as he clicked through a website that, indeed, sold crocks of lode. Lode, being a vein of metal ore contained within a fracture of rock. “I had no idea”, I said in disbelief — still trying to get my bearings. A loud rumbling noise sounded outside my window and we both jumped up to see what it was. Unbelievably, a huge truck was driving by the Tiny Spoon Nut Butter factory… carrying one giant, ceramic crock in its bed. “What a load of crock,” I said in amazement. We dissolved into laughter.

Aaron left my office to go check on the sprinkle stirring machine, which was making an odd whirring noise. “Just jiggle the handle!”, I shouted encouragingly as he left. I looked around my office, still feeling slightly disoriented. I was half expecting the Cat to pop out from behind my bookshelf to let me know that we weren’t done yet. I looked in my storage closet, just to be sure — no Cat. Had I dreamed the whole thing? I felt a little sense of sadness without them — I pulled the Creepy Cat Detective Agency business card out of my pocket again and decided that I’d try calling it… just to make sure that we were done. I dialed the number and was shocked when, instead of a busy signal or a dead dial tone, it was just a recording of Rick Astley singing, Never Gonna Give You Up. Had the Cat orchestrated all of this just to Rick Roll me? That seemed like a stretch, but I couldn’t be sure. As I listened to the soothing vocals… I hummed along. “This song is ridiculous,” I thought to myself as I bopped my head to the beat…

We're no strangers to love
You know the rules and that's that
A full commitment's what I'm thinking of
You wouldn't get this from any other Cat

I turned to look at my phone… was I hearing things? Or did the lyrics to the song itself just change? I put the phone back up my ear and listened… as Rick Astley’s pristine vocals continued.

I just wanna tell you that it wasn't all a dree-eeee-aaaammm

Never forget all you've learned
Never forget what you felt
Never forget what matters in your heaa---rrrrrtttt
Never give up on your dreams
Never forget to let go 
Never lose touch with what's reeeeaaalll.

Stunned, I hung up the phone. I knew that I wasn’t alone. The Cat, in its own weird and creepy way, was looking out for me. I bumped my desk as I stood up from my chair and heard a clattering noise. I was pretty sure that I had just knocked over an entire jar of pickles. “Great, just what I need,” I said. My spirituality was already starting to dwindle. I looked on the ground under my desk and, instead of seeing a puddle of dill juice, I saw… something entirely different. Lying face down on the ground underneath my desk was a small, wooden, hand-carved sculpture… of a Creepy Cat in Victorian Pajamas. “Where did this come from?”, I stammered. Shaking, I picked up the small figurine — I had never seen it before in my life, and I had no idea how it could have arrived in my office. Well, that wasn’t entirely true — I did have one idea. I inspected the figurine — every inch of it was meticulously carved… an exact replica of the decidedly unexpected Creepy Cat Detective that had given me a glimpse into the truth. The Cat had peeled back the fabric of the universe, and showed me something that had been there all along… it had shown me that in every single moment, I could always decide to choose love. I picked up the phone again…but this time I didn’t dial the Cat.

The Creepy Cat Sculpture that mysteriously ended up in my office.

“Dinkleflitzer’s Grocery Store”, a friendly voice on the other end of the line said.

“Is this Donna Lou?”, I asked, “I’m calling about the Butter Bank Awards. I think we need to schedule a dance rehearsal. Let’s really wow them this year.”

I hung up the phone after talking through the ‘turn-turn-kick-turn’ routine with Donna Lou. “Should we wear matching patchwork sweatpants?”, she had asked me. “Oh yes… I replied. My husband loves it when I wear my patchwork sweatpants.” I made a mental note to stitch the bottom hem of my beloved sweatpants for the 10th time. This dance routine was going to take the Butter Bank Awards by storm.

A few minutes later, Aaron ran back into the room. “I fixed the sprinkle machine… but there’s something else. I really want to motivate everybody… I tried giving them all a pep talk, but I dunno… my voice is pretty subdued and I don’t think it helped. In fact, I am pretty sure that everybody worked more slowly after I tried to inspire them. We need somebody more demonstrative… somebody more naturally enthusiastic… somebody more like…”

“Christopher Walken?”, I asked.

“YES! Christopher Walken!! That would be amazing! I don’t know how we would get him to come to Tiny Spoon… I’m pretty sure that actors don’t just show up at Nut Butter factories as motivational speakers….”

I smiled. “Don’t worry”, I think I have an idea.

As Aaron walked away with a little spring in his step, I held the little Creepy Cat sculpture in my hand and cradled it. I thought of the past few… well, I really didn’t know if it had been hours or days or years… but I thought of all of it. I thought of everything that I had seen and felt — the absolute knowing that I had a choice to move forward with love. I closed my eyes and I imagined a swirling maelstrom of cinnamon buns, nut butter, pickles, advocacy, roller coasters, Victorian Pajamas and sprinkles and I tried to see how they all fit together. I wasn’t sure what to do next… I felt stuck, and I wanted the Cat to tell me what to do. I stared into the beady little eyes of the Cat sculpture and looked deeply — I tried to see beyond what was there. What would the Cat do? What should I do? I remembered walking through the dark cloud and reaching for the light. I closed my eyes and I waited. Instinctively, I felt my hand reach for a pen and I started furiously scrawling on back of the nut butter label on my desk:

I opened my eyes. Everything around me seemed like it was twinkling. Here I was in this beautiful little office… making the most delicious sprinkle-laden nut butter that I had ever tasted… working with people that I loved and having the chance to bring a dream to life. I had been given a glimpse into what was possible, and I knew that I didn’t need to know all the steps… I just needed to know the next one… and the next one… and the next one. I placed the Creepy Cat figurine on my desk wrote a little note next to it on a piece of paper. Don’t forget, the note said. I wasn’t going to forget. I was going to walk out of my office that afternoon and into everything that was possible.

As I turned to leave, a glimmer of light caught my eye, “Whaaat was thaaaa…” I gasped. I was sure that the wooden eyes of the figurine had twinkled. A beam of light reflected through the window above my desk, so maybe my eyes were just playing tricks on me… but I had learned that impossible things were more fun to believe in. I looked at the small, wooden figurine and waved. “I’ll be back tomorrow…I’ve got work to do.”

Actual footage… Donna Lou and I take the Butter Bank Awards by storm in our matching patchwork sweatpants:

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Friends — thank you so much for being here and for joining me on the first (ever) Creepy Cat Detective Agency story. I’ve loved writing it… and I’m looking forward to continuing the story in some way. It has been a true joy to turn a really difficult (real) situation into something that has genuinely reminded me that there is so much good in the world… if I remember to look for it. Hidden in the fractures of our lives are the nudges that ultimately lead us back to ourselves.

I hope that all of you have a beautiful week, wherever and however you are right now. I am wishing you all so much ease, peace and joy as we begin this brand new year. You are loved, friends!