the name game

I have a Siamese cat named Chloe. I have a two-year-old daughter with the same name.

The cat goes ecstatic at the sight of a fly trapped in the window screen. The kid sneaks up on the sleeping cat and prods her behind with a long-handled spoon, and laughs wildly when the cat jumps up in terror. Both of them love soft bread. Both of them have evil tempers.

When we call out “Chloe!” both cat and child look around to see which one is guilty. To solve the problem, we added a description at the end of the name. Now we have “Chloe the Cat” and “Chloe the Kid.”

But it’s such a mouthful, so we tried calling one just “Cat” and the other “Kid.”
They wouldn’t respond. Maybe it felt like we grown-ups weren’t according them the proper dignity befitting the name, which is one of the many names of the Greek goddess Demeter.

My elder daughter suggested that we change the name of her little sister, so that the cat can lay claim to the name. The nanny argued that it didn’t seem proper for a child to give way to a mere cat. The cat sniffed and looked insulted.

Finally we came to a solution. We’re sticking with Chloe, and we just wait to see which one jumps. We’re also checking closely which one nibbles on the cat biscuits.