Cat Daddy: What the World's Most Incorrigible Cat Taught Me About Life, Love, and Coming Clean by Galaxy Jackson

Author:Galaxy, Jackson [Galaxy, Jackson]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9781585429370
Publisher: Tarcher
Published: 2012-05-10T05:00:00+00:00

Journal! *Nothing* your cat does is random. He is built for routine. Chronicle your activities and his activities. When does he use the litter box? When does he act out? What time do you wake up and come home and how does the energy change in the house? Noting the details is indispensable, especially as you try to work out a behavioral plan of action.

We started up the stairs. This time, I would not overthink the approach, and I would absolutely ignore Smoky. Just invent something to talk about as we passed him so all he heard was an ease in the cadence of my voice. Of course, I also had Donna lead the way, so as to mitigate any possible territorial stress he was feeling. As we talked about it, it turned out that this final insane behavioral turn hadn’t started until the new babies had come into the house. And as soon as I saw their room, just to the right of the landing, everything made sense quickly. We all know that the nature of cats is a territorial one; Smoky, as more children arrived in the territory, recognized them as über-important components to the safety of the whole; he would assume this “protector” persona, and, sure enough, it worked! Strangers kept their distance from that all-important seat of the territory. With the arrival of twins, the combination of his perceived job coupled with the territorial overload had simply proven too much. He was stressed out, and as a result, he could no longer inhibit his actions.

We started by letting Smoky know that, in fact, every room was important. That might sound counterintuitive now, but I thought that if everything was equal, the castle would be, to a degree, indefensible—and he would have to release his tight grip of control over it and perhaps surrender.

We took one of the twins’ blankets and rubbed it all over the place. I brought the rocking chair and Donna brought the babies downstairs so she could nurse and tell stories in the middle of the living room instead of doing it in the nursery. They had been feeding Smoky upstairs, too, so we brought his food downstairs, brought his toys down, spread everything out. And finally Smoky could say, “Ahh, that’s right, there’s my food and my water. Oh, I smell the baby right here. Litter boxes with my scent spread throughout. Great, that’s mine, too. All of this is mine, and there’s no Alamo to defend.” By the time we were done, we could see Smoky relaxing in front of our eyes. He was a different cat.

When I got home, I looked in the mirror and the gift of recovery unfurled, because I could remind myself that I had something after all. I had a bed to get into, a door to lock, a window that looked out over the beautiful Flatirons. I had a remarkable experience that I was sober enough to remember and feel grateful for despite the oozing and throbbing souvenirs.

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