When you are CAT, you do not stew.
You do not meditate on the meals and mysteries that led you here.
You do not agitate over the salmagundis or stroganoffs you have been unjustly denied.
You keep moving.
Fluid, fire-roasted, CAT is always moving. Even when her eyes are closed, there’s that murmur of the third eyelid below, that flicker of fervor simmering on the front burner.
CAT has enough history for a century of analysis. Scarcely escaping the equivalent of an orphanage, our city-shelter survivor could write books on attachment theory, cat’s search for meaning, and the Enneagram type most likely to successfully agitate for 30% more meat nuggets on behalf of the entire shelter population.
Cast from hope’s nest by DISEASE and age, CAT could summon Freud and Jung and Oprah and Jake from State Farm to study the nature of resilience, the archetypes that heal, and the melodic metaphysics of the feline ego.
CAT could spend every waking hour scouring the pans of her past for gristle and grievances.
But CAT does nothing of the sort.
CAT keeps it moving.
CAT came to Tabby’s Place in the little boat of improbable hope, borne above the boiling broth of misfortune. She did not need to row, for mercy’s oars are self-propelling. She did not need to worry, for peculiar persons were engineering her ascension. She did not need to pack self-pity, because that stuff is full of sharp seeds that will get stuck in your teeth and your trust.
She needed only to keep moving.
Moving, to the day she was dolloped like goulash into our laps.
Moving, to the place she would be properly princessed — a verb every cat implicitly understands.
Moving, to the moment that was The Moment, and then to the next, and the next, and the next.
Moving, without agitating or even marinating.
We, the dotty pinto beans, may sometimes escape the boiling point of agitation. But marination is another story. No matter how mindful we may be of the meaty moment, we just can’t stop thinking about it, turning it over in our ladles until it’s mushy with overthought.
Meanwhile, CAT keeps moving.
CAT knows how to be held, and she knows how to behold. She knows how to ripple with reggae elation when the smashed sardines arrive, and she knows how to find oneness with the Frozen blanket hot from the dryer. She knows how to limit her attention to the love right in front of her, which is the one way to be limitless.
And she knows how to let it all go, because she keeps moving.
Even her fellow felines would benefit from a bowl of this wisdom.
If every cat is an exquisite therapist, an astute observer of psycho-social realities, and a visiting scholar on the subject of bolognas rare and common, CAT runs rings around the rest.
While CAT2 wails and gnashes his teeth at 4:11pm, raging against the dying of the dinner — why must it end? why do the smashed sardines not procreate on the plate? who is responsible for this sorry state of affairs, and when are they up for reelection? — CAT is unconcerned. CAT keeps moving.
While CAT3 slams his self-esteem into the door when his favorite shnoogler departs — where do the peculiar persons go when they go? why can’t they live here? is a litter box beneath them? — CAT is sanguine. CAT keeps moving.
I imagine CAT, as much as CAT2 and you and me, would like all forms of bliss to be unbroken. Let the string cheese unspool eternally. Let the meaningful conversation — the one where you and another being get each other at the minestrone-hearty level — never end. Let the soupcon of a sense that “all is well” be frozen in jumbo ice cubes for infinite leftovers.
Or, let the moment be the moment, and let faith take care of the next one.
CAT’s life has gone from greasy gruel to a mug of comfort, but I suspect CAT has been sagely seasoned through all her seasons. She does not so much go with the flow as she is the flow, and frankly I want to go wherever she’s going.
But CAT is not worried about any of that.
CAT is not worried.
CAT is walking, and she’d sure like to take us along. There’s delicious living to do beyond the stew.