Prep time: one winter
Start with a cold floor.
Take one small striped cat and a house with tiled floors. Let her walk every room twice and find nothing warm enough. Leave her unimpressed. This part can't be rushed, and she'll make sure you know it.
morning, at the back window
Find the sun. Become the loaf.
Sunloaf has one job. Every morning a square of sunlight comes through the back window, and by the time it lands on the sill she's already in it: paws out, eyes half shut, judging the yard.
- Sill: occupied
- Eyes: about 40% open
- Plans: none
mid-morning, still warming up
How to make a Sunloaf.
A recipe handed down from nobody, tested every single day since the first warm morning. Serves one. She will not share.
You'll need
- 1 tabby, striped and opinionated
- 1 back window, facing the yard
- 1 sunbeam, fresh daily
- 0 plans
10:40 am, the back window
Add one sunbeam.
At twenty to eleven the sun clears the fence and drops a square of light on the windowsill. Place the cat in it. You won't need to: she's been sitting there since 10:38, staring at the spot where it's about to be.
Paws out, tail over
Shape into a loaf.
Fold the back legs under. Stretch the front paws toward the glass. Hang the tail over the edge so the whole house can see the sill is taken. You don't have to do any of this. Warm cats go loaf-shaped on their own.
Serves one
Bake daily. Do not disturb.
Leave on the sill until golden. Repeat tomorrow. Somewhere along the way the house stopped calling her anything but Sunloaf. She doesn't answer to it. She answers to the sound of a can opening, which is close enough.
Sunloafif found, return
to the window
to the window
noon, the brightest she gets
Field notes on a loaf.
Pick a marker
Every stripe has a reason.
Five parts of her, each doing a job. Tap the markers on the photo. She won't feel it.
Roughly how a cat sees it: reds go muddy, blues and yellows stay, edges soften. Cats trade colour and detail for seeing well in low light.
afternoon, the light sliding east to west
The sunbeam has a route. So does she.
One patch of light crosses the house every day, and she's in it the whole way, one room behind the sun and never losing it. Tap a stop to see where she'll be.
Stop 2 · 10:40 am
The windowsill
The good one. Glass on one side, a whole yard to judge on the other. This is where the photo was taken, and where she would like to be left alone, thanks.
Right now
The sill clockon the sill
On the sill. Paws out, eyes at forty percent. This is the photo.
golden hour, the good light
Leave her a note.
Write something you'd only ever tell a cat. She'll sit on it, which is the highest honour she gives paper. Your note stays in your browser and goes nowhere else.
0 / 120
Note received. Sat on.
SL-0000after dark, the window turns into a mirror
Catch what got in through the window.
Five things slipped past the sill tonight and they're drifting around this part of the page. Catch all five and she'll tell you what she's really been watching all day.