Cats

I grew up with cats. And when I say cats I don't mean the pampered type that have collars and eat out of dishes in the house. I grew up with a herd of barn cats. Natural selection controlled the population (well, mostly the coyotes). The spring kittens were our adventure each year. First, with the covert military preciseness that my sisters and I would use to track a new momma kitty to her litter. (We could fake baby kitten meowing like nobody's business.) Then with the taming of the wild, spitting, hissing balls of fur once momma was tired of moving them.

Then the summer brought everything from fishing trips up the creek with cats in tow, to biking trips where we figured out how to configure baskets and bungee cords into first class seating on the way to the deep spot in the creek where we would swim. The dogs on the ranch were for working, the cats were for play.

Luckily I married a cat person. We have always had at least one cat since we have been married. We started with Squeaker - the peach point Siamese mix that came with Tim and considered me to be no less than that of the ultimate wicked stepmother.

We are currently down to one cat again - which feels strange. Abby is the last of our original pets that we brought with us when we moved. She showed up on our door - well actually flew in through the front door at our house in Burns one morning. She had been dumped near where we lived several miles from town. She soon became Hannah's constant companion and I am sure in her opinion was responsible for much of Hannah's formative early upbringing.

Now Abby at 14 is suddenly acting like a kitten again. She has developed a new bedtime routine at night now that our other cat is gone. She gets up on the bed (which isn't as easy as it used to be) and gets attention and then lays down for awhile. Then every night right on queue she jumps off the bed and goes to the corner of the room behind our bedroom door and starts to chase her tail. She does this for 10 minutes or so and then eventually jumps back up on the bed to sleep for the night. I don't know why she does it and I am not sure if she knows. But over the years I have learned some of my most important lessons from the animals in my life. I think Abby does it because she can. So I am thinking that I need to remember to do things because I can no matter what my age. And not worry about the 2 people across the room wondering why I am chasing my tail. : )