There was recently a Time Magazine story on animal friendships. It detailed the intimate and friendly relationships of bears, monkeys and other animals. There is no doubt to me that Roxie, the Japanese bobtail cat and Jean Claude, the black Bombay cat share a great love. Despite their bickering, fur snatching and overturning of objects in the heat of battle, they are truly enamoured of each other. They provide each other comfort, protection and inspiration. Besides when it’s all said and done, Roxie, though half Jean Claude’s size, can and often does kick Jean Claude’s tin-can. She is a queen. Now a brief dedication to another Queen – departed from this world too soon. Whitney Houston’s music lives on.‘.
Category Archives: Inspirational
All We Need Is the Songtrack
Roxie, very often walks around as if she has a songtrack in her head. Of course she realizes she is a celebrity. She seems now to have a constant need to play with her laser toy – day and night and she let’s me know it verbally. As I am the person who must manuever the laser I assure you having a meowing cat pounce on you in the middle of the night is not amusing. Roxie in particular likes running up and down the house stairs following the small laser light with intensity, clearly fascinated.
Self-Ownership
I recently finished reading “Propoganda” a book by Edward Bernays. Bernays, a nephew of Sigmond Freud, was the founder of modern day public relations. According to Wikipedia he had an extraordinairy career. Bernays was a keen observer and exploiter of human behavior. He was an engima…launching campaigns to encourage Americans to smoke cigarettes and in later life helping to found The American Lung Association. In so many ways his predecessors. Recently my mentor, Ofield Dukes, a man of quiet strength and powerful purpose passed away. Ofield too was in public relations. It has made me very sad but it also caused me to think about how we as individuals so often sucumb to others way of thinking and doing things. Go-along to get along. We lose in the long run. Ofield, despite his great achievements was a man of humility. He was also a man, who owned his own public relations firm for more than 40 years. He also was the owner of himself. He was not afraid to share or care for others.
The Sass is Back
Most of you know that Roxie and Jean Claude no longer reside with me on a permanent basis. At first when I would visit CCL’s house there were clear signs Roxie, the Japanese bobtail missed me – if I took a nap on CCL’s sofa, she would sleep on top of me. She came to greet me as does Jean Claude, the black Bombay who thinks he a dog, as soon as I opened the door to CCL’s house. Once situated she started to come around after I had been in my daughter’s house for awhile, a low herself to be petted and rubbed and then proceed to prowl and walk around as if she were queen of the manor. At some point Roxie was not herself for a couple of days, she refiused to come downstairs and was tender when picked up, perhaps a set back following her surgery last fall but the last few days I went to visit her she seemed to be her old self – Queen of the Manor.
CCL and I recently went to the Sachal Vasandani , – A Chicago-born jazz singer of Indian descent – amazing. Sachal’s “Eyes Wide Open-Naked As We Came” truly fits the “Rhythm of Roxie.”
Because I got high…
So many of you know that we let Jean-Claude and occasionally Roxie roam our respective backyards. Jean-Claude now demands to be let out and even knows that the sound of the trash bag being changed usually means the door opens. We usually let JC out more than Roxie b/c JC will actually come back when called and although he can be naughty at times, will generally come back within an hour. He can even knock on the door. Roxie, well, Roxie is special and that is why we love h At times, JC can be, shall we say insistent, that he be allowed out. At my house I’ve seen even more of that behavior and I think I understand why.
JC is an addict and needs to get his buzz on.
I’m a container gardener and in one of those containers, I’ve been growing catnip. For the longest time, JC was completely uninterested in it. However, there were several neighborhood cats that would hop the fence and munch on my stash. Due to the rash of warm weather that we’ve been having, I’ve been letting him run the yard. For awhile, because my gate was broken, he could easily explore and roam the neighborhood, but he would always come back when called. Then after the gate, his explorations were limited the 120 sq I have or so.
Then I crushed up a leaf of fresh catnip from my container. JC loved it. He went over to the plant and started munching. Then roaming, then munching, then roaming, then munching. He loves it. For those that don’t know, catnip really does give cats a buzz. Afterwards, he did what I call the catnip roll when they have the good buzz and rolled on the walkway.
I’ve given the cats dried catnip, but this is the first time I’ve seen either one of them eat it fresh. JC then proceeded to climb the tree in my yard where he watched the world for a bit. Then he went back to the catnip and had some more!
When I left him this morning, he settled in for a long nap. He had thoroughly cleaned himself, positioned himself just so on the bed. Sweet dreams JC!
Cats & All That ™ 