Tag: cat

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Owl or Pussycat?

Daily writing prompt
Which animal would you compare yourself to and why?
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Well, now, that’s a tough one. I’d like to be a wise old owl (well, maybe not old, although I’m getting there), but that’s a myth and I’m really nothing like an owl. If owls truly were bookish, that would be me. Again, a myth.

The simple fact of the matter is, I’m more like my cats than I care to admit. I have my spurts of activity followed by long rest periods. I like my routine, except for getting up at dark o’clock in the morning.

Now, unlike my cats, I don’t care for seafood. Nothing that lived underwater, nuh-uh. And I do like a little more variety in my meals than they seem to need. But I really don’t need a whole lot of mixing it up in the kitchen, literally or figuratively. I’m content with only some variety. Or let me put it this way, I like the option of variety.

But the kitties and I have another thing in common. They check out the household on a daily basis, and so do I. They’re looking to mark territory, I’m looking to plot my next cleaning move. But you’ll see all three of us wander from room to room.

And I do like yarn. I’m constantly having to keep my cats away from my current knitting project.

I hope I’m as sweet and gentle as my kitties, but I doubt it. I think I have a little sharper edge. Okay, that might make me a little like Mimi. I guess female cats are somewhat feistier.

So, hmmm, if, like some say, my cats think I’m just one giant feline, maybe they’re right.

Image Credits: Owl at computer © Taras Vykhopen–stock.adobe.com; Cat and yarn © kenza–stock.adobe.com

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Silly Question…

Daily writing prompt
Dogs or cats?
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If you know me at all you don’t need to ask that question. It’s cats, of course, right now my precious Walter and Mimi. It goes back to when I was eleven and we got our first cat, Whittier. From the start, my dad tells me, I was drawn to that cat far more than the multitude of dogs we had.

Which is why it was devastating when, after only a few short weeks, Whittier was run over by a neighbor who didn’t see her when he drove his truck into our driveway. I mourned that sweet, pretty kitten for days. Then we found out the folks we’d gotten her from had two more kittens available, Hugo and Petunia. We ended up taking them both home. Petunia, like Whittier, was a calico, while Hugo was a tabby.

Okay, this isn’t Salem, but she was just as pretty–and long-haired.

As you might guess, Petunia had kittens when she was barely grown herself. But again, tragedy struck, and Hugo was mauled by another neighbor’s dog. (Turns out that dog had attacked other pets before and eventually tried attacking a child. The end of the dog.) We’d come to enjoy having two cats and kept one of the cats from that litter, an all-black cat we named Salem.

When my parents divorced, we had a dilemma: what to do with all the animals. My mom moved out of state while my dad got an apartment. My brother, sister, and I didn’t have the space or resources to care for our pets, so our broken family found new homes for them. Actually, the story behind the cats was a little different. My brother took them with him to college, where they eventually found new homes with other students’ families.

Fast forward to the time I moved to Nashville. I wanted a cat and after living there for a year finally adopted Paco, the cat of my heart. I’ve told the story of how Paco and I saved each other in my blog post Coming Home to Paco, so I won’t go into it again here. I lost him thirteen years ago, around the time Walter and Mimi were born.

However, I didn’t adopt Walter and Mimi until they were about six months old. They’d been abandoned by the folks in the apartment above me in the middle of January. It was cold and icy out, and their cries kept me up all night. Despite the fact that I had no job and was in debt to the Cat Clinic, I brought them in. One of the best decisions of my life. Today, as I write this, one is at my feet and the other is on the windowsill. We just celebrated their birthday.

I think I’ll always have a cat in my life, at least as long as it’s practical. So Cats or Dogs? Cats. Invariably cats.

Image Credits: Banner–cats looking down © emzee-stock.adobe.com; black cat © shchus-stock.adobe.com; group of cats sitting in rows © alexkich–stock.adobe.com