2007-11-05
Pet the Pet
It's still 90 degrees in this town during the day but at night, it's getting down to the fifties.
Luckily, my cat is on a bigger timer than the day-time temperature in Tucson and she's bulking up for winter and has returned to being the lovely lump of cat that had made every winter her in Tucson cozier and warmer.
I love it when my cat gets fat and lazy and loving.
She avoids me a lot of the time when it's ultra-hot and that's just as well. There aren't many less-pleasant sensations and that of having a warm kitty curl up next to you when it's 104 degrees at 9 pm and you can't stop sweating with pre-existing dirt stuck in every pore you have.
Neither the cat nor I want to be touching - she'll sleep on the cool stained glass of a table I have most of the time and I'll flop around like a whale in my sweaty bed until even the dog goes to lie in the kitchen, on the tile.
Ah, but in the winter-time, the same cat is as enticing to me as a mythological bag of Chili-Cheese Fritos that I could eat and not gain any weight from, ever, at all.
To her, I am Nirvana, a perfect chub of a girl cross-legged and alone on her couch with nothing to do but throw a toy for the dog.
This means there is another hand free and the cat correctly diagnoses that the hand is missing a small animal to pet.
She jumps up on the couch next to me and shoves herself into the space between my leg and a pillow, wanting to be warm with me and wanting me to scratch her head while she looks down on the dog, who is innocently waiting for me to throw the pink, indoor Frisbee that's her new favorite toy.
This is heaven - a dog who puts the toy in my lap so that I virtually don't have to move to entertain her, and a cat who is big and warm and silky-soft letting me scratch her head and purring for me.
My dad told me once when I was very little that you don't have to pet a cat. If you just put your hand out, the cat will move her head or body to exactly the pettings that she wants.
I love that - I love that I remembered it and that it's true.
Yes, it's no secret how I feel about my sweet doglet. Rosie is the kind of animal who adorably takes up and entire room despite her diminutive size. She's so clever and so communicative that you can't help but interact with her - everyone does it.
But in the space I make for my cat, there's something mystical almost.
A friend of mine told me that my pets are the most quintessential pets she's ever seen, that my cat is such a CAT and my dog is such a DOG.
I loved that, too; also because it's true.
As such, I have to make a special space for my cat and when the heat is finally, hopefully winding down, when the sun is setting earlier than I remembered from last year.... it's the cat who is making my home feel like a HOME.
arizonasarah at 1:24 p.m.