It’s National Cat Day!
This isn’t about cats, it’s about you.
As we celebrate National Cat Day it is a time to reflect not just on the mystical, soulful spirit that cats possess, but on our need to find connection, and the magical gift we receive when we fall in love with other creatures.
Are you thinking about adopting a cat? Or perhaps you just don’t understand them and you want to learn a little bit more about these magical creatures. Some people think that cats are aloof and independent. And some are, just like some dogs are independent as well. Cats may give the impression of aloofness because they are less demonstrably effusive as compared with many dogs. But they’re just quiet and focused. Once they have made that connection with you, it goes very deep, in both directions. My best friends are cats.
Jenny
One of my cats Jenny, blind-from-birth and the smartest cat I have ever known, likes to fall asleep on my lap, so that she can continue to nap after I’ve gotten up. I’m like her sleep aid! My other cat Cricket doesn’t wake me up in the morning by pawing me or licking or nibbling. Instead, she lays against my side and purrs until I wake up. What a way to start one’s day!
Cricket
As someone who works in animal welfare I’ve worked on all sorts of cases including with harder to adopt cats, and cats that need extra help. In 2011 I went to the site of the EF5 tornado that ravaged Joplin Missouri, a tornado that destroyed the entire town, killed hundreds of people and left 1200 cats and dogs homeless.
The author at the Joplin, MO tornado site.
There I met a cat I named Petunia, a cat who was so terrified she never came out of her “hidey box” that was inside her kennel at our emergency shelter. She couldn’t interact with people at all. I would speak to her very gently, every day and one day, without warning she came out of her box and blossomed into the incredibly friendly and affectionate cat that she really was but to me alone. She hid whenever anyone else approached. With time she warmed up to everyone, her unspoken thought, “I made it, I’m alive again, thank you!” I wanted to bring her home, but the rules were she could only be adopted at the adoption event being held weeks later. I vowed that if she wasn’t adopted, I would fly back from New York City and get her. But of course, she was adopted!
The experience of relieving Petunia’s suffering was our mutual gift to each other. In animals that can’t speak for themselves, relieving their suffering is experienced as a gift they give back to us, selflessly, a type of love that flows in both directions at the same time. All of a sudden, they have a voice, and it is pure love.
This work that I do on behalf of, and in service to, animals, reminds me always of one glorious thing, and that is our shared humanity. At my animal shelter I watch people walk past the sweetest of cats all the time. Be the person who pauses for a second as you start to walk past that kennel. Turn your head back and look at them quietly looking at you, yearning for a better life. A young child at my shelter made a sign that hangs on one of our walls. It says, “You can’t buy love…but you can rescue it.”, and you can too. Happy National Cat Day!
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Stephen Quandt is a writer, author and certified feline behavior consultant and the founder of Stephen Quandt Feline Behavior Associates. He has over 20 years experience working with cats and dogs in the field and in shelters including the ASPCA and currently with the Animal Care Centers of NYC. Stephen is the author of a new children’s book, Happy Comes Home and two webinars, Decoding the Mysteries of Cats, and The Dogs of Chernobyl: a Story of Hope and Resilience which he gives to the public through libraries as well as to NGOs, shelters, rescues, vet practices and companies. He is widely quoted in national publications like Newsweek, Reader’s Digest, Chewys, Forbes, PetMD.com and Rover.com and he is a columnist and the official cat behavior expert for Pet Lifestyles Magazine.
For more information, please visit Catbehaviorhelp.com. Across social media he can be found @catbehaviorhelp and on TikTok @cat_behavior_help. He has two cats, blind-from-birth Jenny who rules their home and her bestie, Cricket.
All photos courtesy of Stephen Quandt (c) copyright 2024. All rights reserved.
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