Of cats and heart-break

Virtute the cat explains her departure
by The Weakerthans

It had something to do with the rain leeching loamy dirt
And the way the back lane came alive, half moon whispered "go"
For a while, I heard you missing steps in the street
And your anger pleading in an uncertain key
Singing the sound of you that you found for me
When the winter took the tips of my ears
Found this noisy home full of pigeons and places to hide
And when the voices die, I emerged to watched abandoned machines
Waiting for their men to return, I remember the way
I would wait for you to arrive with kibble and a box full of beer
How I'd scratch the empties desperate to hear
You make the sound that you found for me
After scrapping with the ferals and the tabby,
Let you brush my matted fur
How I'd knead into your chest while you were sleeping
Shallow breathing made me purr
But I can't remember the sound that you found for me
I can't remember the sound that you found for me
I can't remember the sound

Recently I’ve found myself sort of obsessing on the above song from the latest album by the Weakerthans. If you don’t know the band or their last album, some context is required. On their last album, Reconstruction Site, one of the best, or at least one of my favourite, songs was called “Plea from a cat named Virtute”. In this song the cat sings about how she is worried that her owner is depressed and she wants to get him motivated and to do stuff (e.g. “so we should open up this house/ I’ll invite the tabby two doors down/ you can bring your sister if/ she doesn’t bring her basset hound.”) This was a very sweet song about the relationship between the cat and her owner. But in their new album “Reunion Tour” there is the above song. It seems that Virtute has left. There is a sense in the song that it is a natural thing, she leaves and then forgets human society and becomes pure cat again. She forgets the language they had shared, the “sound” that he found for her.
When I first really listened to the lyrics this song broke my heart. I felt it on a completely visceral level, I actually felt a pain in my chest. Or maybe ache is a better word. I found it sooo sad and heart-wrenching. It has been a long time since I was this touched by a song. This disturbed me at first. I saw it as perhaps evidence that I’m some sort of socio-path who can only be touched by sad songs involving animals (don’t even get me started on that evil Christmas carol about the cat and the mouse trapped outside…). Am I really that much of a misanthrope?
But I thought about it some more, and listened to the song more times. Finally, it hit me: this song can be read as so much more than just a song from an errant cat to her owner. The reason it had such resonance with me was because, well, because I’m a cat person AND because it is also about alienation and failure in communication in human relationships.
Let me explain: It is that when you are in a really close relationship (and this can be a romantic one or even a friendship) you create a sort of language together. You build common jokes and stories and even phrases and allusions. You build up this wall of intimacy together against the world. Not against in an aggressive way but there is a separation of the two of you from the rest of the world; a place that is just for you. A sound that you find for each other. These bonds, affinities, of love or even friendship are so infinitely strong, yet infinitely fragile at the same time. And when, for whatever reason, they break, like really break, they are in most cases never fixable. You can still be friends, you can patch up your friendship, but you never really get back to that spot, that ‘us two against the world’. You never speak that same language again. This, to me, is one of the saddest things in the world. The line “I can’t remember the sound that you found for me” just breaks my heart – it calls to mind all the alienation and disconnection I’ve felt when my relationships have been broken (and even, and maybe especially, if I did the breaking), its like being exiled from a place where you were really happy. But as happy as you were, there is no going back, you couldn’t find that place. But it is this lack of understanding, that to me is soo much like forgetting how to speak a language – so you can’t communicate anymore. You can talk to this person but you will always be speaking different native languages.
So this song reminds me of all the times I’ve lost language – lost the ability to communicate with someone. I think it is the saddest thing in the world. I don’t know if this is what John K. Sampson meant when he wrote the song, or if he was just singing about a cat running away. But I guess it doesn’t matter what he meant, it is about what I get out of it. And to me this song captures such a painful and palpable sensation of loss. This to me is what I look for in music – for authentic emotion and for songs that really make me feel something, no matter how painful.