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I spend a lot of time with my roommate’s cats. I love them. They’re beautiful and adorable creatures, each with her own distinct personality and mannerisms. I could (and sometimes do) watch them all day. When with friends, these cats oftentimes become the shared focal point during lulls in conversation. As though hypnotized, every few minutes or so, we’ll all watch Naira pounce on a bottle cap that fell on the ground while Zola hides behind our large standing plant, and we’ll remark on how fun and squishable they are before picking them up or giving them belly rubs.
Watching them chase after each other, batting at each other with stiff paws, scratching at their little cat posts, gnawing at toy ropes, and pouncing on small trash on the floor, it’s hard not to smile. When they play, they’re practicing for the hunt that they, unaware of their own domestication, will never experience. We sort of did stuff like that, too, when we were kids, playing tag, wrestling, napping in strange places, until we grew up and many of those rituals either went away or changed form. I’m not so sure that these cats will ever stop playing, even though, aside from the fringes of our living room rug, they have no enemies, no prey. They’re preparing for a life that our societal advancements, with high-rise apartments, cat cafes, and Fancy Feast, have rendered completely obsolete. Their lives are essentially simulations of the predators they might have been.
I’m not gonna start talking about the purpose of a cat, because that is a different (and larger) question. I’m just saying that in their ritualistic, primal behavior, these cats aren’t so different from us. They learn through playing, and they adapt to their surroundings. If we rearrange furniture, even momentarily, they’ll pounce on it and explore the new layout, finding new platforms to leap off of. If we have friends over, whom they deem strangers, they’ll hide underneath the coffee table or Yoav’s bed, hoping to avoid detection. The way a cat feels when a huge cardboard box is left out in the open, free for them to frolic inside of, probably isn’t that different from when I stumble into a food festival or some such treat on my way to the park on a sunny day. When they play-fight with each other, nibbling and pawing at each other, it’s not so different from martial arts classes, dance-offs, rap battles, popularity contests, business competition, or chess matches. It’s all just (relatively) innocuous challenges meant to improve some sought-after skill.
We might be higher-minded beings than these cats thanks to, at the very least, our incredibly refined understanding of language, but we also like to play and compete. We have our mannerisms and our go-to reactions for certain types of situations. We adapt to our surroundings, whether that means exploring our environment or fitting into a social group. Our behavior happens for a reason: whether we realize it or not, we say and do things because underneath, we believe they’re good for us, even if those things exist to prepare us for an outdated type of life that, once again, our own societal advancements have rendered completely obsolete.
Plenty of bad jokes have been made with this idea in mind, the ones that go “Observe X person in their natural habitat,” but if we can discard that cliché, I like reframing my life this way. Thinking of myself as an animal with “extra stuff” on top empowers me, ironically. I become acutely aware that I’ve created most of my problems in my own head. I realize that my life is largely about adapting to scenarios I never expected, the same way these cats simply respond to our attempts to play, to their Fancy Feast cans being cracked open, to new cardboard boxes materializing. I understand, like these cats, that I have basic wants and needs, and I can’t ignore them just because I think I’m better than that. And if Naira and Zola can live such simple lives and remain the most carefree and squishable creatures in the world, then maybe I can buy the wall art I want without worrying if it’ll fit with the rest, and I can go for a run without fretting so much about the distance I have left. There isn’t enough time to worry.
Other Things Of Note
Speaking of humans and creatures, the anime show Attack on Titan, which is about the human race fighting mysterious human-eating giants called Titans. I shall say no more, besides that it is intense and action-packed, full of jaw-dropping reveals as questions are raised and then slowly answered.
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Only Child is a bi-weekly newsletter where I find excitement in the mundane. Tell your friends and enemies to subscribe!
—Chuckry Vengadam (@churrthing)