Cats: tame / wild

Day #5: Animals and their people / people and their animals

Tomo assumes the position, as does his cousin, “A Sleeping Leopard,” by George Stubbs, 1791. (Disclosure: I colorized it a bit.)

Little Grey and Cloe were 19-year-long companions whose affection I had to earn. Big, good-natured Kumo just disappeared; a coyote, I think. Butch-the-Tree-Stump was my worst cat. Exceptionally stupid, he did find the sense to disappear just before I had to leave on a long trip. I brought Ninja back with me from Japan, where he had killed a poisonous mamushi snake and deposited it as a gift, not quite dead yet, to coil by my pillow. On our trip to America, flight attendants plied him with sushi. Genji, dressed in black, was untrainable. I shared a studio with friends including Mary, a woodblock artist, who stored her financial records in cardboard cartons under a work table. After discovering that Genji had been using them as litter boxes, we all hoped for a tax audit that year.

Hooligan my big orange boy, is as full of affection as he is devoid of elegance. He ambles from person to person at gatherings, flopping at feet and inviting belly rubs. He stayed by my side while I recovered from an injured Achilles tendon. My Covid kitten, Tomo, (above) tore through two screens and hacked the heavy cat door to make his case that he was not too young to be an outdoor cat. First day out, stuck up a tree.

Dogs are domesticated creatures; cats remain part wild.

Me & Hooligan

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