Personal Reflection
There are mornings when I wonder why anybody pays for entertainment.
I have cats.
That means programming begins whenever the hell they decide it begins, there are no reruns, and apparently nobody in management has heard of reasonable broadcasting hours. One minute the house is quiet enough that I can hear the coffee settling into the cup, and the next there is a thump from another room followed by the unmistakable sound of something sliding across the floor that was never designed to slide across the floor.
Then comes silence.
If you live with cats, you know that silence is not reassuring.
Silence means somebody is thinking.
Sooner or later, one of them strolls into the room wearing the particular expression cats have perfected over thousands of years of domestication: I don’t know what happened in there, but I suggest you investigate the other cat.
No subscription required.
The strange thing is how easily their nonsense becomes part of the architecture of your life.
There is always something happening just beyond the edge of whatever I am trying to accomplish. A tail crosses the bottom of my monitor. Something furry occupies the notebook I intended to write in. A cat becomes fascinated with a cardboard box despite the perfectly good bed sitting three feet away. Then, without warning, one of them launches across the room as though an invisible assassin has entered through the kitchen.
I don’t ask questions anymore.
Some mysteries should remain mysteries.
We spend an awful lot of our lives searching for something to distract us. We subscribe to this, stream that, scroll through another thing, and complain when there’s nothing worth watching. Meanwhile, life keeps performing these ridiculous little scenes around us without asking for our attention.
Cats understand this better than we do.
They can spend twenty minutes studying a dust particle floating through sunlight as though the secrets of the universe have finally revealed themselves. They can turn a paper bag into unexplored territory. A window becomes television. A moth becomes mortal combat. A cardboard box becomes beachfront property worth defending with their lives.
Maybe they know something.
Maybe we’ve simply become too sophisticated to be easily amused.
Or maybe we’ve forgotten how.
Then there are the quieter moments.
The house settles. The evening comes down. Whatever catastrophe happened earlier has been forgotten, although I may still be wondering why something is lying on the floor. One of them curls nearby. Another finds some impossible position that appears medically inadvisable but apparently constitutes comfort.
For a little while, nothing needs to happen.
That may be the part I would miss most.
Not the chaos itself, although I suspect I would miss that too. I would miss the presence behind it—the small sounds from another room, paws crossing the floor, the sudden weight beside me, the ridiculous interruption that forces me out of whatever cavern I’ve wandered into inside my own head.
We tend to think life happens during the important moments.
Maybe it doesn’t.
Maybe a good portion of life is happening while we’re waiting for something important to begin.
Sometimes it looks like morning light across the floor.
Sometimes it sounds like something falling off a shelf.
Sometimes it is a cat sitting three inches from your face at an unreasonable hour, staring at you with the intensity of someone who has been trying to reach you about your vehicle’s extended warranty.
And sometimes you look around at all this completely unnecessary, inconvenient, beautiful nonsense and realize the house would feel terribly empty without it.
So, no.
I don’t need cable.
I’ve apparently been renewed for another season of What the Hell Are You Doing Now?
The ratings remain excellent.
Reflective Prompt
What ordinary nonsense in your life would you miss terribly if everything suddenly became quiet?
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This was great. It reminded me of my cat Sebastian. We had a few cats, and he was the boss. He would walk out of a room like nothing happened while chaos was going on in there with the other two cats, and you know he caused it.
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Sebastian knew exactly what he was doing. 😂
That innocent walk out of the room is the giveaway. Meanwhile, the other cats are standing in the wreckage wondering how the hell they became accomplices.
Cats have mastered two things: creating chaos and establishing plausible deniability.
Thanks for sharing this, Kevin. Sebastian sounds like he was quite the character.
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Such a great read! The bit about your cats is hilarious! It makes it more funny because I can TOTALLY relate! They for sure are entertainment and keep you busy. As quick as you dit down , you have to get back up to investigate what they did now.
My oldest cat likes to knock clear glasses off counters and tables. They fight over cardboard boxes and chase invisible specks of dust or the tiniest fly. I wouldn’t trade any of them for the world though.
Thanks for this! I needed the laugh this morning.
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And there it is—the universal pet experience. 😂 You finally get comfortable, hear something from the other room, and immediately think, “What the hell was that?”
Funny enough, this quote came straight out of one of those moments. I was literally talking to one of my daughters while watching my feral cats go at it when I said, “Who needs cable when you have cats?” She laughed and immediately started telling me about her dog.
Apparently, chaos doesn’t discriminate by species.
The clear-glass habit would have me negotiating with that cat on a daily basis. Of course, I suspect the cat would have considerably better representation.
They drive us crazy, interrupt everything, claim ownership of things we actually paid for, and somehow we wouldn’t trade them for anything.
I’m especially glad this gave you a laugh this morning. Thanks for sharing your crew with me.
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Hah something fell earlier and all my cats scattered from different directions. God only knows what it was and which one did it. There’s 5 of them 🤦🏻♀️.
I should thank you, for sharing your cats funny moments with me and for the laugh! Much needed 😊
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Cat watching can be very therapeutic. Ive been most enlightened by asking them questions telepathically. A cat once told me he was here doing ancestral healing work for his bloodline due to traumatic soul damage done by *trigger* sacrifices done to his lineage in ancient times.😳
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Well, now I’m wondering what answers I’d get if I started asking mine questions. 😂
Although, considering some of the looks they give me, I’m not entirely convinced I’m prepared for the conversation.
There is something therapeutic about simply watching them, though. They seem perfectly capable of becoming completely absorbed in whatever has their attention at that moment. We humans could probably learn something from that.
Thank you for sharing your experience.
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You have a lovely sense of humor. I agree. My cat taught me how to rear children😜😉
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Love this Mangus. I’m OK with cats, but as you know, dogs are more ‘Me’. Maya can be a pain, but she’s our pain and the joy and pleasure she brings is priceless. Everybody gravitates towards her, even those afraid of big dogs tentatively ask if they can touch her, and soon they are giving her a head rub and she’s putty in their hands. She is a credit to her breed, her breeder, and us. She’s loved and spoilt to bits, and like her predecessors, has a place in our hearts that can never be replaced.
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I know, Di. Maya has made enough appearances in our conversations that I would have been surprised if you didn’t bring her into this one. 😂
And believe it or not, until a few years ago, I was a dog man myself—specifically German Rottweilers. So much so that my family was completely taken by surprise when they found out I had a cat. Apparently, I had crossed some line nobody expected me to cross. 😂
I think that’s really the heart of what I was trying to get at, though. Cats, dogs—it doesn’t particularly matter. They become woven into the ordinary rhythm of the house until it’s difficult to remember what that rhythm sounded like without them.
“Our pain” says it beautifully. They aggravate us, inconvenience us, worry us, cost us money, and occasionally make us question their sanity—or ours. Then they wander over, put a head beneath a hand, and somehow the account is settled.
Give Maya a head rub from me.
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Done.
Our pets are more than companions. Maya looks out for Hubby and is a good support dog. She hasn’t been trained as such, she just ‘is’ as she is so tuned into him.
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Excellent essay, Mangus.
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