"Cat"

 

My dad is convinced that he speaks, “cat.”

He says that he understands what the cats want

And that the cats tell him what they need.

In all actuality, the cats simply want food and

Know that he’ll give it to them.

As a result, he hasn’t trained them,

Rather they have trained him,

And they keep him up at all hours of the night,

Demanding to go in or go out,

Begging for dry food or turkey.

 

I tell him to ignore their demands,

But he swears that they will just swat at him and get mad.

He said that Annie Mae got mad on Sunday morning,

Hit the chair,

And then stomped off for hour.

She may have,

But she was better by Sunday afternoon,

When she told me

(Yes, I speak, “cat,” too)

That she wanted to take a nap.

I obliged,

And she did what she always does

When she’s being affectionate:

Hopped onto her spot,

Made biscuits,

Turned around,

And laid down right next to my leg.

 

Annie Mae is not an overly affectionate cat.

But when she wants pets,

She lets us know.

And when she wants to nap,

She curls up beside me,

Always touching some part of my body,

But never laying on me outright,

Because that would be too much love.

 

In so many ways, people are like cats.

We tend to be the center of our own universe.

We communicate what we want both passively and aggressively and

We hope that someone listens.

We’re opinionated and prickly at times,

But even then,

We want someone with whom

We can be ourselves,

Rest, and

And feel safe, warm, and secure.

 

I hope that each of us can know and experience

Even a fraction of the love and

Life of comfort that

Annie Mae has come to live.

From thrown away teenage mother to

Queen of the House,

She is teaching me about

Adoption, redemption, and love…

All in her language of “cat.”

Cats

 My cats are weird.

(I think all cats might be weird.)

And they have such different personalities.

 

Annie Mae is spicy and aloof.

Sigma Ray is docile and loving.

 

Annie Mae will only eat turkey directly from my hand.

Sigma Ray will only eat turkey off the floor.

 

Annie Mae will only drink water from her personalized water bowl upstairs.

Sigma Ray will drink water from anywhere, including my dad’s cups.

 

Annie Mae will only eat cat food if it’s been freshly poured into her bowl.

Sigma Ray will eat cat food anytime it’s available.

 

Annie Mae refuses to let you touch her pretty, fluffy belly.

Sigma Ray doesn’t care if you touch his belly, his nose, or his tail.

 

Annie Mae stirs if you come upon her sleeping.

Sigma Ray sleeps hard and long and just keeps right on sleeping if you come upon him.

 

Annie Mae likes boxes.

Sigma Ray doesn’t know what to do with them.

 

Annie Mae likes to hunt.

Sigma Ray is a lover, not a fighter.

 

Annie Mae is calm and content with the ground.

Sigma Ray is spastic and curious and climbs all over everything.

 

Annie Mae knows her name.

Sigma Ray does not.

 

Annie Mae will sometimes respond when I say “comeeer, baby.”

Sigma Ray just looks at me like I have a hole in my head.

 

Annie Mae is a secret purrer.

Sigma Ray purrs very loudly and makes no secret about when he’s happy. 

 

Annie Mae has sort of figured out my schedule.

Sigma Ray has not.

 

Every day, when I come home from work,

Annie expects me to come upstairs

So she can sit beside me

While I do my blackout poem.

If I don’t immediately do this,

Then it throws her off, and

She acts out of sorts until I do.

I think this is funny.

But it warms my heart.

And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

 

My cats are weird.

And I bet yours are too.

Or your dogs.

Or your bearded dragons.

Or your hamsters or ferrets or snakes or cows or any other pets that you have.

 

Pets are some of life’s greatest blessings.

Amen?

And amen.

 

Hissing Resistance

 

Queen Antoinette, otherwise known as Annie the Cat,

Is having a hard time sharing her throne with her adopted brother, Sigma Ray.

 

Annie Mae has been an only cat child for around two years.

She has had full reign of both inside and outside the house,

Securing favorite sleeping spots in every room and

Granting herself access to every point of entrance and exit.

She has had a personal Butler in my dad,

Who feeds her whenever she demands it,

Which is why she’s quite robust,

And part of why she is struggling to welcome a creature who is vying for her food.

 

I know that feeding an animal is a sure-fire way to make the animal your own,

Whether you want the animal or not.

But as soon as I saw Sigma,

Tiny and starving,

I knew I had to give him food.

I couldn’t let him suffer.

And he was suffering,

Unbeknownst to us at the time,

With two broken back legs in addition to an empty belly.

But even in his suffering, Sigma was the sweetest boy,

Rubbing against my legs,

Letting me hold him,

Purring louder than all of Annie’s purrs put together,

And being genuinely happy to be around people.

He even let my dad hold him,

Which secured his place in our household,

And allowed him to gain three pounds in two months :-p.

 

Yet Annie is struggling,

And she’s expressing her displeasure with Sigma’s presence and

Trying to establish her dominance over Sigma

By hissing vehemently at him whenever she sees him.

Thankfully, Sigma doesn’t fight back,

Rather he returns to his place as her subordinate.

And he loves her.

Wherever Annie is, he wants to be.

Yet she can’t be bothered.

She has a throne to protect.

 

I imagine that most of us feel like Annie sometimes.

Unhappy with the situation around us,

Unable to change it,

Resisting it,

Sometimes hissing at it (though probably silently),

But realizing that our resistance is futile because change is happening

Whether we like it or not.

 

I’m hoping that time will land the Queen and her subordinate as peaceful cohabitants in Annie’s Queen-dom.

Until then, I will keep loving her because she’s my baby,

But I will love him, too,

Because he’s the sweetest boy in all the land.

 

Amen.

Animal Rescue Videos

 

I can’t decide whether animal rescue videos are good or bad for me.

Sometimes, they make me feel warm and fuzzy.

Other times, they make me sob uncontrollably.

Sometimes, I watch with calm anticipation.

Other times, I watch with agitated worry.

 

In one particular video,

A woman dumps her dog out of the car,

Which, unfortunately, is a common practice.

But instead of leaving the dog,

She goes a short distance away and films what the dog does in response.

He runs back and forth, frantically looking for his owner,

Getting more and more frenzied as he can’t find her.

Here is this dog who knows nothing but being taken care of by his owner,

Left in the middle of nowhere,

With no warning, explanation, or understanding,

Scared, and

Alone.

Thankfully, because the video is meant to be educational,

The dog is reunited with his owner in the end.

But how many animals aren’t?

And how many animals suffer because of the abandonment?

 

So that’s a video that makes me weep.

I actually talked about it in therapy to understand why it was so emotional for me—

Blindsides, cut offs, broken trust, and feeling scared and alone were a few themes that emerged.

 

But then there are those who make me smile…

 

Like the one where a very pregnant stray dog has 15 puppies and they’re each labeled with a different colored collar to keep them straight and they all find forever homes,

Or the one where a dog with disabilities gets a wheelchair,

Or the one where a stray dog goes to the groomer and comes out looking like a different dog all together,

Or the one where a kitten is rescued and grows up to be a champion biscuit maker and cuddler,

Or the one where an eel is relieved of three hooks stuck in its mouth,

Or the one where a black goldfish is rescued from a sickly tank and transforms into a happy orange fish,

Or the one where a wayward sheep is shorn and is released from an 80 pound burden.

I actually really like the wayward sheep videos because the sheep are so trusting of the people who help them.

They’re flipped over and turned around and worked on for a long time because their wool is so matted and full of dirt and sticks,

Yet underneath the outer coat of filth,

They are beautifully soft and white.

 

There’s a lesson in there on that one.

I’ll let you figure it out.

 

So yeh.

I can’t determine whether animal rescue videos are good or bad for me.

I blame Facebook for putting them in my algorithm.

And I blame Annie the Cat for being a real-life rescue story that has caused me to put all kinds of human emotions on animals!

 

God: Thank you for animals. And help us, God, to take care of them. Forgive us when we neglect your creation and abandon your creatures, and help us, as a whole, to be more responsible stewards and to do better. Amen.

A Tale of Two Cat Rescues

 

My Facebook feed is full of animal rescue videos.

I’m a sucker for a good rescue story,

Although I admit that some of them make me sad.

I don’t understand what part of someone thinks that throwing animals in dumpsters is at all okay.

But that’s not my point.

My point is that I watch a lot of animal rescue videos 😊.

 

Recently, I saw two different cat rescues,

Both from trees.

 

In one of the videos,

The cat gets so scared of the rescuer

That he decides he would rather just jump out of the tree!

I think it was a 20-foot drop,

Limbs flailing in the air,

But the cat was okay!

 

In the other video,

The cat was 50-feet high,

Literally shaking from exhaustion,

And completely relieved when his rescuer showed up.

He immediately climbed into the rescuer’s arms,

Began purring,

And happily let the rescuer put him into a mesh sack so that he could safely make the descent.

 

Two cats stuck in similar situations;

Two very different reactions to someone coming to help.

 

It makes me wonder:

Am I the first cat who was afraid to, or simply didn’t, accept help when it was offered?

Or am I the second cat who embraced help when it came?

Both cats were okay in the end,

But it seems to me that the second cat had a slightly safer journey than the first,

Who went on a great adventure!

 

I’m pretty sure that Annie the Cat would jump if someone came to rescue her from a tree.

She’s not a stranger-truster.

It would be ugly.

I would cry and scream and deem her dead.

Because I am her opposite.

Vulnerable. Trusting. Always putting safety first.

 

What about you?

Do you accept help? Or do you remain independent?

Do fall into safe arms? Or do you try to do things yourself?

 

Oh God: Help us to know who we are and then to be willing to try something different if needed. Help us to know when to accept help and when to go at it alone. Help us to know when to leap and when to fall into open arms. And help us, God, not to let fear lead to make bad decisions. Amen.

Pets

 

 

One of my friends had to have her dog put down last week.

The dog lived a good life.

She was well-loved and taken care of.

She brought joy to my friend and all who knew her.

But it was time for her to go.

She could barely stand up.

She was sleeping all the time.

Her bowels had left her.

Putting her down was the right thing to do.

Yet it was so hard.

And my friend cried.

And I cried, too.

And then I went through all my pictures and celebrated the dog’s life.

And I memorialized her in a tin art,

Because that’s all I knew to do.

 

I read an article about an Hispanic author who wrote a book for Day of the Dead.

I briefly talk about Day of the Dead in October when discussing Hispanic Heritage Month,

So I decided to buy the book.

Come to find out, the book is written to remember a pet.

And my goodness it is sad!!

Both Shauna the Art Teacher and I cried as we looked through the beautiful pages,

And we didn’t even read the text!

Later, when showing the book to another friend,

I cried again.

It’s just so sad.

 

Pets provide us with snuggles.

They provide us with talk therapy.

They provide us with companionship.

And they reduce our stress by making us slow down to pet them.

 

Pets become part of our lives.

They reserve and move into a special place in our hearts

That will never be forgotten,

Even after they leave.

 

Bullet the Dog is 19 now.

He will likely leave soon.

His devotion to my dad and the happiness that he’s brought for so many years

Is something that can’t be replaced.

 

Annie the Cat is three-ish now.

Hopefully she’ll live a long life

And learn how to control her razor claws

As she continues to become domesticated

And demand turkey and pets.

 

Tell me about your pet.

Tell me something that brings you joy.

Tell me something you remember about a pet who has gone before you.

I think sometimes it’s hard to remember because it hurts.

But life is kept alive through memory…

And our pets deserve that,

For they are a gift from above.

 

Amen.