October

Thought For the Month: Being Scaredy-cats
~by Mewsette

Where do you suppose the term "scaredy-cat" came from? Not from us cats, let me tell you! Humans think up stuff like that. Not our own wonderful families, of course; those other humans. The ones who walk into a house, wrinkle their nose, and say "Have you got a cat in here?" They call other humans scaredy-cats as if it was an insult. Well, it isn't!

Our natural fears make perfect sense and are wise to have. But sometimes something silly can scare us, too. Who knows what might be under the throw rug that suddenly appeared over that artistic decor spot we made? Maybe there's a crocodile under there! The only thing to do is attack that rug with tooth and claw to find out. Then we overcome the silly fear. Unless the crocodile eats us. (Just kidding.)

This month is "scaredy-cat" month for us because Halloween is in it. That is scary! I've always thought the most sensible place for me to be when something scares me is under a bed. That includes strangers in the house, thunderstorms, the vacuum monster getting loose, fire engines, you get the idea. I practise hospitality to company under there, I celebrate the 4th of July and New Years under there. And I sure think that's the best place to spend Halloween! My, it's a good thing beds have unders, isn't it?

Is it silly to be a scaredy-cat? Nope, not in my view. And who says we're scaredy-cats, anyway? Well, on Halloween night, I do. I don't think the term is quite right, though. I call it superior feline caution, and I recommend it.

November

Thought For the Month: Being Determined
~by Mewsette

We cats can be very determined creatures! It takes a lot of patience at times, but we have the patience of ..... well, ... cats. These are good qualities to have. These are how we get things accomplished. Perseverence against all odds, right? Well, .....

It wears me out just to watch my little sisfur Phelicity, she is so determined! We have these big, chunky end tables in our living room, with cupboards in the bottom. She's constantly pulling and plucking at those cupboard doors to open them, but they have springs that make them shut again. So her pulling and plucking just makes them go bonk! bonk! bonk! We always know when Phelicity wants in a cupboard by the bonking.

Well, determination pays off in the end, right? Yes, it does. Once in a while she gets that door open wide enough for a second to scoot into the table. But it doesn't work the same from inside. So when the bonking stops, we have to go look for Phelicity and see if she got stuck in there, because she's a proud kitty and won't holler if she did.

I should mention that our mom keeps piles of what she calls important stuff and I call mess in those cupboards. So there might be a downside to the way determination pays off. Maybe it's wise to think about what will happen if we do what we're determined to do. Phelicity got stuck in there for quite a while once, and by the time we got her out, she'd eaten a roadmap of Oklahoma. She didn't feel so good the rest of the day.

There's certainly no downside to using plenty of determination to get a few bites of that Thanksgiving turkey, though. That kind of perseverence pays off very well, and I recommend it.

December

Thought for the Month: Being Peaceful
~by Mewsette

December brings Christmas to our world. Isn't it wonderful? We cats hear a lot of Christmas greetings, lovely Christmas carols, and old sayings, such as "Peace on Earth, Good Will to Men." What does that mean, and why do cats even need to know?

There isn't a lot of peace and good will among humans these days, have you noticed? Good will to "men" means to all humans, of course, but "peace on earth" is harder to define and just gets argued about. So we don't want to use humans for our example. We are just glad to see them with more good will in their hearts at this season, and wish they had peaceful hearts all the time, like we do. Because that's where being peaceful starts, in the heart.

Some of us are luckier than others in the life that we have. I myself am very lucky; don't you feel that way too? But we know that many cats don't have all the blessings we do. Do they hate us because they don't? No, because they have peaceful hearts, too. There is a lot we cats could teach humans about being peaceful, if they only had the sense to learn from us!

Let's remember how good it feels to have peace in our hearts, and to love all other cats. Let's try to pass it on to others, even to our humans. We'll discover that sharing these feelings makes them get bigger, not smaller. We love to share joyful things and give gifts to others at Christmas. Well, sharing and giving away good feelings is part of what Christmas time is about, and I recommend it.

Merry Christmas to all CLAW cats, and to all cats everywhere, and to humans, too! With love and peace from Mewsette.

January 2003

Thought For the Month: Out With the Old
~by Mewsette

Every cat has a set of their own beliefs, ideas and opinions. Sometimes these change over the years, and sometimes not. I myself have such purrfectly good opinions about absolutely everything that I never change them. Do you suppose that, after we've lived for a long time, we may get overloaded and feel like cleaning some things out of our heads?

In January, lots of us make New Years resolutions. Last New Year, I made a good list of them. It didn't work. That might be because I made them for my mom, not me, and she didn't pay attention! Personally, I don't need any. But I love to make lists. So this New Year, I'm making a list of:

Beliefs I Gave Up When I Got Old

1. If I turn my face to the wall, Mom doesn't see me.
2. If I wait 5 minutes, go in another room, and spit out the pill, Mom doesn't know.
3. The kitten who moved into my house 10 years ago will go back where she came from soon.
4. The mousies I stored under the frig will creep out where I can reach them any minute.
5. Mom will let me go outside if I holler enough.
6. I own the entire left side of the couch.
7. A cat's very own basket will never be violated by removing any of her extra fur.
8. If I refuse my cat food and walk away, it will magically turn into a sardine when I come back.
9. Eating a cricket won't make you sick.

That's about all I'm prepared to give up yet. Anyway, 9 is as high as I can count. Of course, there are a few beliefs I'll never, ever give up:

1. All windows belong to me, period.
2. The vacuum cleaner wants to eat me.
3. Cats are purrfect, just as we are.

In case you're cleaning out any old beliefs or adding new ones this New Year, that last one is good. I recommend it.

February

Thought For the Month: Getting Rid of Grudges
~by Mewsette

February is the month when we think about love and talk about it more than usual, did you notice? That's because of Valentines Day. We cats are very loving. Nobody can love like we can. But there are some things that interfere with our showing it. One of those things is grudges.

We cats can be jealous, too. I've been guilty of that myself. Sometimes we might hold a grudge against another cat, maybe a sibling, for taking up space or attention that we consider ours. And in places where many cats come together, it is probably pretty common. But it shouldn't be.

Once I knew a very fine cat who could carry a grudge for years. Oh, she was so good at it! In fact, my little sisfur can carry one for a day or so, and I think she was working on longer. But she couldn't do it, she's soft-hearted. Me, I usually can't remember to carry one for more than an hour. I've tried, too because it seemed like a quite catly attitude to me, until I thought about it. But it takes a lot of energy to stay mad, and I need my energy for other stuff.

Actually, I'd rather just give a nice healthy swat and be done with it. Clears the air. Not that I advocate swatting! No, no! My sisfur will agree that I don't. She'll agree, honest. I've gotten mad at my mom in the past too, let me tell you! One can't live with something as imperfect as a human for 16 years without getting perturbed sometimes. But I just go and pout under the table until she pampers me out of it. Pouting is so... well, er, ....I don't advocate that, either. Not unless you can do it with the finesse of Vivien Leigh. Which I can.

What should we do if we're perturbed? That fine cat I knew could stalk off to a corner and pointedly turn her back on a human. It was so effective! I really admired her technique. My little sisfur tried that, too, but she wasn't any good at it; she kept looking over her shoulder to see if we noticed. We just laughed. Well, I discovered that if I go to my mom and be extra loving and sweet after she's done something wrong, I can really make her feel guilty! Now that's a good catly attribute, making a human feel guilty! So that'll do.

Anyway, if you're busy hold grudges, you might miss out on some petting and snuggles, that really make you feel good. I don't intend to miss any. And if you turn your back when another cat in your house offers affection or friendship, you might have missed something really wonderful in your life that it's sad to have missed. I saw a long time ago that carrying a grudge wasn't worth that. And getting rid of them is very liberating! Throwing them out frees up our minds for more happy and loving things. We deserve happy things, and loving is what we do best. So I recommend it!

March

Thought For the Month: Rich Cats, Poor Cats
~by Mewsette

You know how humans call themselves rich or poor depending on how much money they have? Well, we cats don't do that. We've got no use for money, for one thing, except we do like to see our humans spend theirs on good food, good care, treats and toys for us. What else should they be spending it on, anyway?

I feel like a very rich cat, don't you? We cats of CLAW are the lucky ones. We're all rich in what we need. Some of us may live in "poor" circumstances, but we don't notice because we are still just as pampered. I was raised pretty normally and always had everything I wanted. In fact, I was "spoiled" at an early age. It's good to be "spoiled", let me tell you!

My furmama, who went to the Bridge last year at 19, grew up differently than I did. She grew up poor. She ate whatever was available or hunted her own dinner in her youth. So she never developed the taste for gourmet treats that I had. She never got the hang of using and appreciating all the kitty luxuries that were available to her later in life, the ones I took for granted. She'd sleep on an old box rather than in a plushy cat bed, adopt an old kitchen chair instead of soft furniture or the cat condo. She preferred her basket bare; she didn't like soft bedding in it. And when she could still get into windows, she just sat on the bare sill, instead of lying on the pretty blue kitty window seats. She was really "old country". But she was rich in love, and maybe that's all she wanted.

So you see, it's easy for us cats to be satisfied with only the barest things, as long as we're loved. And there's the rub. There's the real difference between a "rich" cat and a "poor" cat.

We cats of CLAW know all about the multitudes of really poor cats, and it breaks our hearts to know. We know they are in shelters, in pounds, living on the streets, feral in the countryside. We know that if someone loved them, they wouldn't be there. Who can love them? We can.

I think that cats are not naturally inclined to be generous. It's something we learn. We tend to have humans who can be generous when they want to be, and we learn from them. We learn from each other, too, as we meow together about what we can do to help. Broken hearts are soothed by becoming generous hearts.

What my thought this month boils down to is, poor cats are not poor because of things they don't have, but because of love they don't get. And if we think we can't help much about the first thing, we can about the second. We can love them. Then we will do what we can to help them, even little things, from a generous heart. We can get our humans to take food and toys and soft old blankets or sweatshirts to them in shelters, for example. See how the second thing helps in the first thing?

Generous hearts only need to show their love and get to work. I recommend it.

April

Thought For the Month: Shining
~by Mewsette

We cats love most everything that shines. Especially sunshine, which is warmer and more purrfect to nap in now in the Spring. Sometimes we like to chase a little spot of light that shines on the wall, or shiny, sparkley little balls. Some of us love to find shiny little objects on our Meowmie's dresser, maybe a golden earring, and play with it or hide it like a treasure.

Did you ever think that we cats ourselves can shine? Oh yes, much more than our eyes shining in the dark when a bit of light hits them. We cats of CLAW have wonderful opportunities to shine all the time! We can shine in all the things we do here, if we want to. When we do our best at something we like, when we participate in our groups, when we send happy mews or purrs of comfort to other kitties, we're shining! I think every cat should shine, and be all we can be. I like shining, myself, and I like to encourage it in others, too. It's fun to shine!

We cats react well to good examples and good incentive, did you know that? Now I don't mean we should let humans train us easily to do things they think are cute. If we feel like it, we will, and if we don't, we'll ignore them. Who's superior, after all? I mean we should shine for ourselves. Good incentives among other cats can really make us want to shine! Friendly competition, like games have, is good, too. I love games, hunts and contests, don't you? When we hear other cats mewing, or admire what they do, don't we want to mew what we think, or do something ourselves?

Is that showing off? Hmmmm, well, what if it is? Did you ever hear your human bragging on you to somebody else, "My cat did the cutest/ smartest/ funniest thing....." ? Made you feel good, didn't it? I think it's kinda natural for us to show off. And I think it's good for us to shine! I recommend it.

May

Thought For the Month: The "M"s of May
~by Mewsette

I love May. It's a warm, gentle, pretty month; a perfect month for cats, full of sunshine and flowers and happiness. Almost always. There are two special days in May that start with "M"; Mothers Day and Memorial Day. Both of them are days for us to honor others. That's something I like to do, don't you?

On Mothers Day, we have a special day to honor our wonderful meowmies, in different ways than those who have human children might enjoy. I know we plan to give our meowmies lots of extra loving, purring and headbonking, since we can't bring them flowers. We plan to be on our best behavior and be helpful, lapfull and sweet, since we can't take them out to dinner. We are all really lucky and blessed to have the special meowmies we do. I sure am, and I intend to show mine!

There are other mothers, too; our cat mothers. Maybe most of us were not lucky and blessed to have our own fur mothers with us very long, but I was. It was a special blessing in my life to have my furmama with me for 16 years of it. She crossed Rainbow Bridge a year ago this month. But she lives forever in my heart.

So "M" is for Mothers.

On Memorial Day, we honor the brave humans who have given their lives in the service of their country. We fly our flag to show our respect, and we put flowers on their graves to show our love. We cats can't actually do those things ourselves, but we can honor them in our hearts. Memorial Day has a long, long history. It was originally called Decoration Day, because it was the day for decorating the resting places of soldiers.

But we don't stop there. It's also a day for remembrance of other dear, departed ones in our families. I know my mom will remember and honor her human father, who was a Veteran, and her human mother, who passed away last year, on Memorial Day. They live in her heart, too. Cats and humans alike remember.

So "M" is for "Memories".

And when we have done these things, may we look out our windows or sit on our porches, and look at all the beauty and magic around us. May we feel warm sunshine and breezes, see lovely flowers blooming, watch all those delicious ...er, ..delightful birds flying around ... oh yes, it's magic. What a wonderful time of year this is! You just can't help noticing!

"M" is for "Magic", too.

With all the "M"s of May to fill our hearts, to bring us both sadness and joy, both quietude and fun, is there room for any more in there? Oh yes, and we cats are just the ones to find some more. I recommend it.

NEXT