PAULIE WALNUTS AND THE CAT

Tony “T” Soprano is the head of the New Jersey mafia family. His enforcer is Paulie Walnuts. Paulie’s been around a while and was the enforcer for the previous family boss, Tony’s dad. So now Paulie is in his sixties but tries to keep in shape by lifting weights. Paulie was the toughest member there even when shooting an old colleague and friend “Big Pussy”.
Well, some of the guys from Tony’s crew sort of adopted an orange cat that they found and the cat hangs around the office which is a back room of the strip club, Bada Bing. But in the office the orange cat sits motionless on the table staring at the wall-mounted photo of recently deceased gang member, Christopher.It gives Paulie the creeps who, at one point, was going to chase it away with a broom. The photo was moved, and the cat stood at the new location and stared at it.
Near the end of the episode, Paulie in near panic reveals to ”T” (while they sat at the sidewalk table in the sun) that when he (Paulie) went to meet a guy in the wee hours at the deserted Bada Bing, he swears he saw—for just a second—the Virgin Mary in there. Paulie had previously been humbled having barely survived prostate cancer. He reveals now his ominous feeling of doom when the cat is around. He’s certain that with his murderous past, his afterlife will be really fucked. Anyway, “T” doesn’t get it, and just blows it off. Paulie suspects the cat knows something that no one else knows. The cat follows him around whenever it isn’t staring at the photo of dead Chris.



You’ve been falling apart lately, Paulie Walnuts.
Being the same age, I understand.
But ‘dis takes the fockin’ cake.
Aw, Paulie…Christopher’s cat visits Chris’s distant dimension,
But straddles the space to yours.
And even if nobody else knows who he is,
you do.

But you can’t scat the cat with your broom.
He, in his omnipotence, is not the devil.
You see, the devil is an evil creature;
But this cat’s not that personal.
He is merely death
Indifferent
And patient
And certain
And did I mention patient?

Well, if that ain’t enough to unmake a made guy,
how about seeing the Virgin Mary in a deserted titty bar?
Hell, I’d fall apart, too.

But I know where you’re coming from:
When you look up and see that
there’s more behind you than in front of you, and
see you cannot dictate how the game will end.
Your prostate heralds your fortress crumbling,
You sense worms breeching the walls.
Your pumping iron makes rusty sounds
in your yellowing years.
I can see more scalp through your pompadour.
Cold fear slowly cinches your throat, you start freezing up.
You were immortal in your strength when you shot Big Pussy, you big pussy.

Now humbled and hugless, creaking under the weight of your foreboding,
distant “T” cannot grasp the depth of your dread.
Your Brando eye-flick of fear asked father “T” to
repair your falling fortress with his godfatherliness.
Then you sighed resigned to his inadequacy

Death approaches on cats paws and snuggles…
snuggles the sidewalk sun, patient in his orange eyes.
Perhaps the cat’s like me; of them all, you were my favorite.
Perhaps it’s small comfort to know, Paulie,
we’re all afraid of cats.

I was thinking, maybe the Virgin came to tell you
That God bestows his love even unto pricks.
Scamper back to ‘da Bing
And don’t forget your rosary.
It may not be too late for you
To get unfucked.