For a long time, I thought that animals were pretty much as Descartes thought - largely unreasoning organic machines. This morning, my teacher on animal communications died.
Her name was Chesh, and she was 17 and a half. She was a year younger than my eldest, and a year older than my youngest, so we referred to her as the "middle child". Her name comes from the fact that my firstborn is named Alice, so "The Cheshire Cat" was obvious, reduced by said child at 1 to "Cheshycat", and thence to "Chesh".
Apart from having the loudest purr, usually just when one was feeling down (coincidence? Depressed people don't move and make nice resting places), she also showed me that cats can understand spoken words. Chesh had, I am convinced, a vocabulary of about 10-20 words, even when they were spoken in normal cadence in the context of other words she didn't know. The word "food" elicited the right responses no matter how I said it, and "door" would have her move to the door and sit expectantly.
Although petite, she dominated not only the neighbourhood cats, but the two others we host, one of whom is three times her healthy body weight. Personality counts for a lot. It helps if you think of yourself as human, too. She did. The other cats would not try to get on our beds, because she'd warn them off, but she took it as a birthright.
We will miss her.
- Log in to post comments
I'm sorry to hear of your loss. I have two cats that I love dearly, each highly unique, and I hate to think of losing them.
But of course none of your observations (nor mine) are inconsistent with the behavior of "unreasoning organic machines"
True, but if they are, then so are you and I - a conclusion I actually prefer.
My deepest sympathy, John, I know how it feels to lose such a close companion. There are probably many ways to rationalise our relationship with such creatures but none describe how their presence can make our dwellings seem warm and welcoming, how their touch and their purrs can soothe and how just a look from them can irresistably transform a frown into a smile.
And any one Felis sylvestris catus is smarter than all the Cdesign proponentsists put together.
I lost a 21 year old cat last year and know how painful it can be after so long. My condolences.
I'm sorry for your loss.
Our pets are remarkably perceptive creatures, in ways that we would never imagine - not quite human, and yet beyond human in some ways. Who knows what a common dog experiences - I've read speculation that they might even "smell in chords".
A while back, I watched a news show about about a cat that belonged to a hospital worker in New England. This cat was unique in that it could apparently sense exactly when terminally ill patients were about to die. About four hours before the patient would actually die, the cat would curl up beside them (even if it didn't know them), and it was right something like 18 out of 18 times. That's one cat you probably don't want curling up beside you and purring.
My condolences, John. 17,5 is a long time of companionship. I know what you mean she felt human. And no, I don't think it's coincidence. It's a behaviour I've observed and heard reported on cats around the world. Some cat characters "know" when you are suffering and come for support. They have a big healing potential (by fur and purr), both physical and psychological. My late grandma had a pain in her hip for years, she needed an infra-red lamp to sooth it. Then our cat started sleeping exactly on this spot, purring intensely. After a few nights the pain was gone and never came back.
From another cat-lover: my deepest sympathies. And also from Lt. Kizhe, who is currently asleep on my right calf while the laptop perches on my left, and from Russell (full name: Bertrand Alfred Russell Wallace North Whitehead Insufficient Delta-Vee), our Humane Society foundling kitten who is shaping up to be a superb lap-cat and champion purr-er, who just jumped up and nestled in behind Kizhe. My lap is somewhat overfull at the moment.
Yes, they're "only" animals, and we know they will die long before we do, but damn you still get attached to the little buggers. When my Mozart died three years ago, I wept for him, and I still miss him.
That is sad, John. My own cat died at nearly 22 years of age. I watched her being born on my bed, all those years ago. She spent the last year of her life mostly in an electric frypan I set on the floor for her. She could no longer climb, so I set the frypan on low and lined it with cloth so she had easy access to a warm place. A wit in a chatroom told me that it was bad form to place a cat in a frypan. "It should have been a wok!" I called my cat Weazle after the TV show Catweazle.
Commiserations.
I'm sorry to hear of your loss, John. I've lost more than one cat. I remember them all, by name. I never had a cat that I didn't love, or that I felt didn't genuinely enjoy being with me. I guess I've been lucky, and it sounds like you were very fortunate as well. Peace...SH
I am sitting next to a cat who "chatters" in her sleep. She has the same colors as your Chesh, just arranged differently. Some day she won't be there any longer and I will miss that silly sound. I grieve with you, John, because I know what it is like to lose a loved furry companion. Our first cat, Mouse, lived a valiant 19 1/2 years. We are now tyrannized by three small brave creatures who pound on the windows and demand to be let outside at night to slay trespassers.
I wish you the luxury of time so that there will come a day when the memory of Chesh will be sad/sweet instead of just sad and you will be able to think about her and smile.
I had no idea that so many readers here are cat lovers.
Thank you all. I appreciate it.
I'm sorry to hear about Chesh. Over 42+ years we've had both cats and dogs, at least one of each for all those years, and a number have left us as Chesh left you. We remember and miss them all.
You stumble over them as, half asleep, you go to relieve your bladder in the middle of the night. On a cold, dark and dismal winter morning you drag yourself out of bed for that ridiculously early appointment only to tread barefoot in the pile of vomit left strategically in the middle of the living-room carpet. They develop an extremely rare blood poisoning for which the vet presents you with a bill twice the size of amount you have managed to scrap together for that first holiday in five years. Then, they decide it is time to slip off to that happy hunting ground where mice run into open mouths without being asked and bunnies are made of cheese and leave you feeling like some sadist has just removed you intestines with a blunt spoon!
An impossibly large number of cats and dogs have accompanied me on my journey through life and somehow they seem to make themselves indispensable to my wellbeing. Currently I have two cats, Henrie le Piep and The Goddess Kali, and a dog, Frau "Gypsy" Schnuppleberger, who all live with my ex-partner although Gypsy comes to stay some times for the weekend and a second dog Sascha, who has been known to make comments on this blog from time to time. I keep telling myself that should Sascha depart this world before I do, then I will enjoy the live of a normal, sensible pet free human being. Free to travel, free to act spontaneous and irresponsibly. No more vets bills, no more heaps of vomit, no more �walks� in ice rain, no more arguments with the owners of Rambo the hound from hell who is just trying to end the life of your best friend! "It's just normal behaviour for dogs!" "No it fucking isn't!" No more gifts of dead birds, half chewed fish, live snakes, live bats, rat's entrails and other delights of nature. But somehow deep in my heart I know that when the flat is empty and I no longer have to fight for the best seat on the sofa that the next warm blooded, furry, four-legged creature that crosses my path looking for an abode is not going to meet with a refusal.
Because I'm only human,
It's sometimes hard to be
The wise, all-knowing creature
That my cat expects of me.
And so I pray for special help
To somehow understand
The subtle implications
Of each proud meowed command.
Oh, let me not forget that chairs
Were put on earth to shred;
And what I like to call a lap
Is actually a bed.
I know it's really lots to ask
But please, oh please, take pity;
And though I'm only human,
Make me worthy of my kitty!
----------------
It is hard losing a friend and cats are that most times.
@ Jeff: I did a post about that hospital cat. Alas, the original link is 404ed.
http://mikecane.wordpress.com/?s=%22frank+black%22
John: Sorry to read about your loss. I've had many. Some went too soon. It's always hard.
John,
I lost my two dogs in a year's interval, so I know how you feel. I am so sorry for you.
True (and happy) story:
I bought a cat a couple a months ago, and then one night I went to the bathroom all sleepy and all, and I could hear the stream of my pee wasn't... err... regular, so I open my eyes, and there was the cat standing on the edge of the bowl trying to catch my pee with her paw!! That was so funny, it took me forever to go to sleep again! (No worry, I washed her paws ;-)
Again, I am so sorry John. It's difficult not to get attached to these fellas...
Robert M.
John, I'm sorry to here about Chesh: my condolences to you, your family and the neighbourhood feline society. This from both myself and Jack, the Melbournite moggy I provide food and litter to.
You may not notice it, but your house will never smell quite the same again.
Bob
My condolences. I've lost two cats in the past year, but I only knew them each for a few months. I can only imagine what it must be like after knowing one for that long. :(
Cats can indeed understand repeated commands (OK, suggestions). Louis the Cat would Sit, Lay Down, Roll Over, Shake and Get Ready for Chow and for Brush. He taught me to greet him like a cat. (Involves getting down on the floor and rubbing heads together.)
John, I don't think animals understand English. The exceptions to the rules confuse even erudite humans! But they can, and do as they want, respond to familiar sounds. Therefore my advice to cat/dog/other vertebrate pet owners: Always say the same words to elicit a desired result.
Too bad this doesn't work with people as reliably as it does with critters.
May you soon be owned by another critter.
I'm sorry John. Not long ago my cat Chase lost a tooth and became very sick, sick enough that I was worried that he was going to die. I became as worried about his illness as I would have if a friend was having similar troubles, even though he didn't understand why I was compelled to keep bothering him with medicine Ultimately he recovered, but I can empathize with your loss. Indeed, it's no surprise that when I've been away from the apartment for a few days and need to go back to make sure the cats have food, water, etc. I sometimes accidentally say "kiddies" instead of "kitties."