It’s a matter of perspective. While most people don’t appreciate something
dead brought into their house by a cat, I do realize it’s a sign of
affection. I would be alright if they
didn’t love me quite so much, though.
The other day was a new level of love. I found a dead chipmunk in my shoe next to
the table. Later that day, Larry found a
dead mole in his. We are assuming it was
Bella, as Augie tends more towards birds while Bella favors smaller mammals. Thanks guys, but come on already.
The sound that makes our ears pick up is the cat door
swinging open. The cat door is in the
door leading to the basement, where the litter boxes are. The basement leads to the outside world for
the cats during the day, as we leave the hurricane door open a crack so they
can come and go during the day and close it in the evenings so the cats stay
in. They may be mighty hunters during
the day, but once the sun goes down, they move down the food chain
significantly.
The sound of the cat door swinging means, about a third of the
time, a cat is coming in with something. I was doing dishes when I heard the door
swing, and a few seconds later something went thud on the floor. I looked
to see a very large, very dead squirrel lying in the doorway, Bella sprawled
under the table looking at me like “Tah-dah!!”
Not all gifts are deceased, however. I was on the telephone with stepdaughter
Bonnie the other night when I heard the cat door and a minute later heard “Bwaahaaap,” which is not the sound a
tortured mouse normally makes. ”Bwaahaaap” it went again, and I turned to
see a frog come hopping out from under the table, Augie keeping a slight
distance which said “That really didn’t taste too good.” “Bonnie, I gotta go get a frog away from the
cat,” I said as I hung up the phone and raced to get the frog before he went
under something and became unretrievable.
Bella is the snake catcher in the family, and I have taken
numerous small snakes away from her and tossed them back outside. (For all of you who ask, no, I never did find
the faucet snake.) I’ve also come home
to a dead fieldmouse, on its back, all four legs comically in the air, right
smack dab in the middle of the couch cushion.
The only thing missing from the picture were little x’s in its
eyes. And let’s not forget the drowned
chipmunk I found floating in the toilet.
I grabbed Augie and showed it to her; she peered into the bowl with a
look of “What’s it doing in there?”
The wildlife in the house does get old. I came in last Saturday to see Larry lying on
his stomach on the floor on one side of the woodstove, Augie on the other. “Um, whatcha doing?” I asked. “What do you think?” Larry said, and at that
moment I saw a chipmunk run out from behind the woodstove towards the open
door. Augie made a halfhearted move
towards it which sent it running over the back of Larry’s legs (he gave new
meaning to the word “flail”) and under the chair.
Augie had a chipmunk behind the woodstove, which started to
run up the bricks behind it, then jumped in the window to the right of the
woodstove. I opened the front door,
which is next to the window, figuring I could shoo him out the door. Instead, the chipmunk ran past the open door
and dove into the shoes, while Augie ran outside on the porch and looked around
for it. I am dealing with idiots.
For as good the cats are at catching things, once they turn
them loose in the house they absolutely suck at catching them again. Then it’s me who has to catch them. My success rate is better than theirs, but
not perfect. Sometimes I have to wait
until the prey has been worn down before I can help them.
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| Indoor sports - waiting for the mouse to come out from under the chair |
One night the cats were in mild pursuit of a chipmunk they
had brought in earlier, but I could not catch.
I left them to their own devices and went to bed. In the morning I went into the kitchen and
saw it in the cat’s food dish. I stopped
– had they killed it and put it in their dish?
I looked closer and it looked up at me, its cheeks full of cat food,
exhausted, with a look on its face of “You would NOT believe the night I’ve
had!”
One of the good things about winter is that most of this
nonsense ends with the cold weather. But
for now, when I come home, I take a quick look around before I step too far in
the house. Right by the front door where
we keep the shoes seems to be the dismembering area, and I have found heads,
innards, wings, legs and other innumerable body parts on a regular basis. Our late cat Rocky used to leave us chipmunk
tails on the porch. Larry pinned them to
the doorway.
We have a feral cat who comes a visitin’ now and then, whom
we have named BoyToy. A beautiful black
and white male, he is friends with Augie (who’s our social butterfly) while
Bella keeps her distance and glares and growls at him. He keeps a very healthy distance from us;
there is no getting up close and friendly with this guy. Larry keeps hinting to put food out for him,
which I have managed to discourage him thus far. There’s plenty of wildlife for him to sustain
himself without help from us.
Meanwhile, like the toddler who picks a dandelion and
presents it proudly to a parent, we’ll keep thanking our cats for their own
displays of affection. It is love, after
all. Gag reflex aside.
