I’m the fun Aunt! I’m in my thirties, rocking body and the nieces favorite! Travelling is life and wine is my fuel! I don’t need a husband, and I certainly don’t need kids! For what? I have nieces and nephews to spend time with! Always at the kids table! 😜🤣🍷✨✨. Travelling every month and meeting new, exotic men!!

Now in your forties, you feel a tug at the back of your mind as the fun wine aunt begins to settle down into the old drunk relative living alone. You decide to get a cat for company and it works. An adorable little black kitten, you travel with him and give him fancy clothes. “I’ll call him Cab, after my favorite wine!”🍷. Cab makes great photos and proves to be a faithful companion. Cab even has his own Insta following! Good job little buddy. See? I don’t need a family, we are happy and fun and living our best life with out men and children!

Time goes on and Cab gets a little older. He starts to hide and claw and turns into a full size cat. You see him, an accelerated vision of yourself….Has the cute worn off of me just as it did Cab?
No! No, that’s nonsense! But Cab needs a friend right? Let’s get another kitten! I’m the cool wine aunt with kittens! 😺🍷 So you get another one, a little orange kitten. Little Spritz! So Spritz gets the attention now as you begin to slow your vacations down. You just made fifty and don’t move as well as you once did. But that’s okay, I’m still a powerful woman! I just don’t travel as much. Your family, you notice, get married and have children and work, and seem to have less time to spend with the fun aunt. Why don’t they visit? Why are they spending so much time with their spouses and children? What about me, I’m family too?!

One Tuesday night, you’re polishing off another bottle of Pinot Grigio and decide that you’re going to surprise your niece. You saw on Insta that she is having a get together with some work girlfriends at her house. The dad’s are all playing poker and watching the kids. “I’ll stop by, it’ll be great!” You think. You get into your 2004 Mazda Miata and drive over to her house. In your buzzed stupor, you realize as you pull into the driveway that your forgot to put on makeup and change the shirt that Spritz tinkled on. No worries, they probably won’t notice! You knock on the door and a confused 24 year old answers. “Becky?” She says “I think someone’s here for you.” Your niece comes to the door, just as confused as her friend. She looks you up and down and asks whats the matter. Are you okay? “I’m here to party, and I brought wine!”

“Oh,” Becky says. You see the embarrassment begin to set into her face, as a room full of young girls in their twenties stare in disbelief at the situation unfolding in front of their very eyes. “I’m so sorry Aunt Marley, this is a baby shower for a work friend.” As you see the hanging blue baby carriages and rattle shaped cookies, you realize for the first time what you’ve done. You state your apologies and begin to back up. Becky tries to pathetically invite you in but you decline, running back to your Miata. You need to go home and take care of Spritz anyways.
In horror, you drive home swerving as the last of the Grigio hits your liver. The blue lights behind you seal your fate. You are arrested for DWI and spend the night in a cell next to a drunk college girl and a woman who bit a man for not giving her crack cocaine outside the 7/11. How did you get here, you shouldn’t be here.

The judge gives you an ankle monitor and puts you on house arrest. No more vacations. You wouldn’t go out anyways because you’re absolutely mortified when you realize what you did. 4 missed calls from Becky, and then your sister begins knocking on your door. You hold Spritz and refuse to open it. I’m not ready to face them yet. You can’t leave, but it’s okay. You have your cats. Cab is here somewhere, he had an accident when you were in the clink. The smell attracted a few more cats to the back yard. Well you’re gonna be at home for a few more months, what’s the harm in feeding them? It’s just a couple more.

The months go on and before you know it, you own 12 cats. They’re expensive but that’s okay. You have the money. And you have wine! But you haven’t had a chance to clean up yet, so no one can come see you. Not yet. The weeks turn into months, months into years. You slowly slide into the trap of complacency. Without ever realizing it, you went from the fun wine Aunt in her thirties, to her. The one you swore against. The very thing you never believed you could be…


You are the cat lady.