According to World Population Review, more than half of households in Arkansas share their space with a dog. Arkansas has the third highest dog ownership rate in the country, and more than a third of Arkansas households have a cat — seventh highest rate of feline companionship in the nation. So we expect Scott Simon's brand new book, "Ulysses S. Cat and Other Animals I Have Known," to sell well here. Simon, the longtime host of NPR's Weekend Edition Saturday, writes about not just the animals he shared his home with, but the animals he's met working for NPR. Though Ulysses S. Cat gets the honor of being the title animal of the new book, readers first meet Penny, a dog Simon still holds in high regard.
Scott Simon: Oh, so much. I mean, Penny was in many ways my introduction to family. With all due regard to my mother and father and my grandparents, Penny would hover over my crib and I would reach up and touch Penny. And when I was learning to get on my feet, my motive was to reach up and be able to hug Penny around her neck. She was a constant part. She looked after me when I napped. She worried about me when I got up and was crying and would alert my mother. She was so important to our family. And as I describe it, she was a washed-out Chicago police dog who didn't make it through the training. My grandfather — Irish side of my family — was a Chicago police sergeant. And with all due regard to those great dogs that did make it, I think Penny just might have been a softie. But she discovered my grandmother when she left this earth at her own hand. And I will never forget — I was so young at the time — but Penny walking alongside my grandmother as she was wheeled out of the apartment. My mother went through a lot of loss, obviously, including her mother. The first time I saw my mother cry was when we got news that Penny had died. She was that significant a relationship in our family life. We loved her. She taught me a lot.
Kyle Kellams: What I love about the book "Ulysses S. Cat and Other Animals I Have Known" is, yes, it's about animals. But we see these animals as you're assembling a crib, or through your consideration of a possible afterlife, or when you're covering the destruction in Sarajevo. There are animals all along the way.
Simon: That was, I think, one of the most important human experiences of my life, not just reportorial experiences. One of the things that deeply moved me and made me connect with the stories of people in Sarajevo at this terrible time of loss and fright and suffering — it was very important to them to keep the animals with whom they shared their lives alive and going. They would share their meager humanitarian food supplies with their animals, with their dogs and cats and hamsters and parrots. Manoli Wetherell, my recording engineer, and I came under fire quite a few times. But once while we were doing a story about somebody walking their dog in the middle of sniper fire, because the Sarajevans would explain to us, you can't explain to a dog there's sniper fire out. We can't go outside. And I was just so moved by that. And it underscored for me the fact that the animals in our lives are our running mates through life. They are with us every step of the way. They make allowances for us. We make allowances for them. We help each other along the route. They become milestones in our lives, too.
Kellams: In the book, we meet Grasshopper, a turtle, worms. But I should point out, the shortest chapter is titled "Obedience Training for Cats."
Simon: I believe I say there is none. Right?
Kellams: Yeah. That's been my experience.
Simon: And as I discovered, obedience training for dogs — at least our French poodle, Daisy — was more obedience training for me. Because I'm usually the first one to say, oh, it's okay, that sort of thing. Daisy was a good sport.
Kellams: You write that we don't have to offer explanations to our pets. And that's one of the great things about our companions.
Simon: Yeah, I think it is, because we do speak different verbal languages. So we have to recognize and empathize with each other on another level. You can say anything you want to a pet, but all they really understand is your outstretched hand, the food in their bowl, your arm around them. That's what they understand. That's how we communicate with each other. And we might be alerted when our dogs bark, although we can be forgiven for saying, what is it, Daisy? What is it? And we sometimes, like I do, fill in the sentence ourselves. But what happens is that they learn to communicate with us directly in the same way. And this all makes our lives richer.
Kellams: Another thing I appreciate about the book is if you're going to write about animals you've known, you have to write about loss, and you do that in the middle of the book. I was so afraid it would be toward the end.
Simon: Well, you do know, as a generalization, when you take a pet into your life, at some point part of the experience is going to be bidding goodbye. And we do it over and over because the joy of that companionship is worth having. Because the richness of that relationship is worth going through. Because the more we love them, the bigger a loss it is. And yet our hearts grow. Our hearts heal while still having a crack or two in them. And then we open them up for another experience.
Kellams: What do we call ourselves, those of us who share a home with animals? I'm like you — I don't like the term "owner." That sounds too cold.
Simon: I've never come up with something that really means it either. I guarantee you, at some deeper level, we do not own Daisy. We do not own Gato Blanco. They're their own agents in life. What I settle on is "running mates." We are each other's running mates through life. We're with each other step for step and we're important milestones in each other's lives. In fact, I wanted to call the book "Running Mate," but the publisher pointed out people would think I was writing about vice presidential candidates, and that does not have sales written all over it.
Kellams: Daisy, a poodle — how much do you talk to her?
Simon: All the time. From the moment — well, when I get up at 5 a.m. to write, this book included. When I get up to write at 5:30, we have a daughter who lives with us who opens a deli at 6 a.m. and works at a barn later. I try not to wake Daisy, but she will sometimes look over at me, and I go, hi, Daisy, be quiet, okay? Be quiet. As if that will make any difference. And when the time comes for a walk — forgive me — I have a little song. "Let's go walking, let's go walking." And I spend a lot of time talking to her. And she, as far as I'm concerned, talks back. I consider myself Daisy's interpreter. It's a responsibility I have in life. She's a French poodle. So I imagine, I infer, that when we're walking and she's just dazzled by human company and she gets up on her hind legs and gets so excited — I know that Daisy is saying in her heart, I am cute, huh? You cannot resist me, huh? You would like to pet me, huh? Now my wife, who as you may know is French, thinks there is something inauthentic about the French accent which I bestow on Daisy. And all I can say is, darling, I pass on what I've heard. What else can we do in journalism, Kyle?
Kellams: That's right. For a French poodle, it's a pretty good accent.
Simon: I think it's a great one. Thank you.
Kellams: The name of the book is "Ulysses S. Cat and Other Animals I Have Known." Scott Simon, as one running mate to another — thank you for your time.
Simon: You have a Daisy?
Kellams: I have an 11-year-old Australian cattle dog named Daisy.
Simon: Oh, well. Our best wishes to Daisy.
Scott Simon's book, "Ulysses S. Cat and Other Animals I Have Known," is available now. You can hear him on Weekend Edition Saturday, Saturday mornings beginning at 7. Our conversation took place over Zoom late last month.
Ozarks at Large transcripts are created on a rush deadline and edited for length and clarity. Copy editors utilize AI tools to review work. KUAF does not publish content created by AI. Please reach out to kuafinfo@uark.edu to report an issue. The audio version is the authoritative record of KUAF programming.
