There had been many a Jellicle ball before, but none like this one, for something was about to happen, something very special.
Her name was Jemima. She was just a kitten, but she was more than that, much more. From the day she was born she was destined to do great things. She had been blessed with an understanding of things no other cats could dream of..., and she didn't even know it yet.
She grew up like any other kitten. She was playfull and happy, she could find fun in anything she did. Her best friends were Etcetera, Victoria and Electra, but she never really fit into that group. Often you would find her alone, staring at the moon, almost with insight into what was to come.
The moon had been her friend from the very beginning. She was born under a full moon, and it was somehow connected to her in a way that no one can fully understand. She often just stared at it, she could for hours. You could call her name and she would not hear you, she'd be far away, captured by the brilliance of the moonlight. Being Jellicles they all knew the importance of the moon, but none of them fully understood it's true meaning.
She had been blessed with a knowledge that usualy came by great hardship or by great wisdom.
The moments of happiness.
We had the experience, but missed the meaning.
And approach to the meaning restores the experience
in a different form beyond any meaning
we can assign to happiness.
The past experience revived in the meaning,
is not the experience of one life only,
but of many generations.
- Not forgetting something that is probably quite ineffable.
True happiness is only important if you can understand its meaning. And in one's struggle to find what happiness means to that individual, that person will come to realize that happiness is not what one person experiences, but what everyone experiences, and not just now, but in the past the present and the future. Once you understand that true happiness is not defined by a single event, but by a way of thinking and a way of looking at the world, then happiness will mean so much more to you. You can look back at your life and say without a dought "I was happy then". And hopefully you still will be. You can find true happiness through the memorie of happiness.
Moonlight, turn your face to the moonlight.
Let your memory lead you.
Open up, enter in.
If you find there the meaning of what happiness is,
then a new life will begin.
The moon has always been there. The light and the darkness, the sun and the moon, the one giving life, the other taking it. And what is a life, but nothing more than memories. This is what Jemima understood, perhaps not even consiously.
The moon holds all secrets, all memories. The Jellicles worshipped the moon from the very beginning. And very few cats understood; perhaps a cat that had gone trough great hardship and now could only look back, and another, older than the wind, who had seen life come and go, but the memories still stayed.
But all things must end. And as the moon claimed the night, the sun reclaimed the day and the memories faded away. As important as the moon may be, Jemima new that there could be no Darkness without light, no night without dawn. The Jellicle moon that shedd its divine light apon the cats was now slowly being replaced by the new light, the new life.
Daylight, see the dew on a sunflower,
and a rose that is fading,
roses wither away.
Like the sunflower I yearn to turn my face to the dawn.
I am waiting for the day.
But as bright as the sun may shine, she darkness will always return, the moon will always shine as brightly as the sun, and so the memories will live on. As the trees lay down shadows on the ground, they remind the sun that his time is short.
Sunlight through the trees in summer,
endless masquerading
Like a flower as the dawn is breaking
The memory is fading.
Once, along time ago, Grizzabella was happy. This was probably all that counted to Jemima. She knew why the other Jellicles dispised this old street cat, she even echo'd their own words, but she could find no wrong in this cat, she felt no hatred agains her, in fact she was curious, almost entranced by this old cat. She knew that Grizzabella could once again be happy. She had known true happiness, and knew that her memories of that were all she had left. Her time was growing short. Grizzabella knew that if these cats would accept her for what she once was, for her memories of happiness, then they would all understand. And when Victoria touched her, she knew she had been saved, and her happiness touched them all. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Author's Notes: Wow! All the above I wrote last night, I was in one of those creative moods again, that's when I put my very best on paper (or on magnetic image). I wote it all while glancing up now and then at the full moon, I don't think I ever saw it so brilliant as last night, talk about inspiration.
What I love about Jemima is for the most part summed up with the above, however, on top of all this Jemima (or more perhaps Veerle Casteleyn) is achingly cute. These to combined make sure I gasp every time I see her in the vid, or live in London. But I can't stress enough that dispite her great emotional understanding of the world around her, she is still an innocent, naive little kitten, who is as playfull and energetic as the rest of them.
Good discriptions of her caracter can also be found in the following stories, all taken from 'Exporing the unkown'; 'After the Jellicle ball' -by Britta/Jazzer15. Oke, so that was only one so far, that just goes to show the need for a good representation of her caracter. There is one story about Jemima herself :'Jemima the Good Kitty'. As the title sugests, this story does nothing to make the caracter grow, in fact it is more of a Sillabub story, I don't really like this one, even though it is written well. Oh yeah, Petra seems to have a good take on Jemima, whitch he prefers to call Sillabub, but while he has a good take and his spelling is excellent, his grammar leaves something to be desired.
Anyway, I hope this rather cryptic doc help a bit towards your story, take all of it to heart, or none of it, its your story. As I once said, this is MY interpretation of Jemima, and others may not necceseraly agree, but you asked for my view, and I gave it, I hope it is helpfull.
Good luck and many Purrs,
Jemimus