About the Time I Traveled for 3 Months and My Cat Filed for Abandonment
There comes a time in every emotionally fragile woman’s life when she books a one-way ticket to “literally anywhere that isn't here.” For me, that time is every year. I pack up, kiss my pets goodbye like I’m off to war, and disappear for three months to “find myself” in a country where I don’t speak the language but do know how to order wine and say “sorry” with my eyes.
This most recent time, I returned home sun-kissed, culture-enriched, and spiritually renewed — only to be met with the icy death glare of a furry dictator named Pato. My cat. Who, I’m 90% sure, called a lawyer while I was gone and is currently seeking damages for emotional distress, unauthorized snuggling substitutions, and abandonment of motherly duties. The case is currently titled: Pato v. That Bitch Who Left.
Let me clarify: I do not leave my pets to fend for themselves like a chaotic Disney villain. I hire trusted pet sitters. I leave detailed instructions. I buy enough wet food to qualify for bulk discounts and a loyalty card. I set up cameras. I send check-in texts like a nervous mom whose toddler is at their first sleepover. I video call my pets, okay? I have sobbed into my phone while my cat looked directly into the camera and clicked “Leave Meeting.”
And yet… every time I say goodbye, I feel like I'm slipping a note under their paw that says, “It’s not you, it’s Greece.”
Because yes, more often than not, it is Greece. Or Spain. The two countries that make my pets physically ill — not because they dislike them, but because they know those are the countries I fantasize about moving to. Like, full-on, pack-my-bags, burn-my-passport, “I’m Mediterranean now, bitch” type of delusion. I walk into a market in Málaga and suddenly I’m like, “I could buy olive oil here for the rest of my life.” I breathe the air in Naxos and think, “This is it. This is where I become whole.”
Meanwhile, back home, my pets are hosting a silent protest. No cuddles. No purring. Just disdain. My cat once puked on my suitcase. It wasn't even open. That was a targeted attack.
Still. The guilt is real. I feel like Cruella de Vil every time I close the front door with a suitcase. But so is this: I love my life. I’ve built a life where I can just go. I can cry in a café in Lisbon and no one knows me. I can fall in love with a Greek stranger and ruin it in under 48 hours. I can eat bread in five different countries and justify it as “cultural immersion.” That’s not selfish. That’s growth.
But every time I come back — from Milan, from Madrid, from Skyathos, from somewhere with tile floors and dreamy light and existential clarity — I do penance. I cancel plans. I don’t leave the house. I enter what I call the Fur-Based Forgiveness Program™. Two weeks of guilt cuddles. Apology treats. Quiet confessions whispered into twitchy little ears. “I’m so sorry. I’m never leaving again,” I lie, through my guilty, sun-drenched smile.
Because I will leave again. And again. And again. But I will always come back.
And one day, if I ever do move to Spain or Greece, my pets are coming with me — fur, sass, passive-aggressive puke piles and all. I’ll get them little pet passports. I’ll learn to say “he’s just grumpy” in five languages. I’ll find the perfect ray of Mediterranean sunshine for them to nap under.
But until then, I’ll keep doing what I do: chasing freedom, collecting stamps, and coming home to the only judgment that truly matters — the cold, dead stare of a cat who knows exactly how long you’ve been gone.
