Hudson Valley Astrologer

“A cat has absolute emotional honesty: human beings, for one reason or another, may hide their feelings, but a cat does not.”

~ Ernest Hemingway

Cats are special animals! They are somehow connected to the mysterious, metaphysical plane, which may explain why we always see cats with witches; never dogs with witches. I am definitely not a witch, and chances are, if you see me at all, you’ll see me with a dog.

But I did have one pet cat and he was absolutely amazing. He was like a dog! Go figure!! He’d accompany the kids to school and walk with them until they were inside and then he’d turn around and come back home to wait out the day, until they returned. He’d sit sometimes in the middle of the lawn, like he was waiting for a mouse, only he wasn’t. He was waiting for his people. The kids would show up eventually, traipsing through the hemlock trees with grass in their hair, always ready to play. BaBa would just get right in line. No fan fair. No jumping up and down, no tail wagging, no spin-o-ramas, or paws raised, waiving at the empty air as if he couldn’t connect on a high-five. Cats are just too cool for all that…

That does not mean however that cats are not sensitive. They are exceedingly sensitive, and often can be harbingers of things to come. Especially within family dynamics, if for example there will be an abrupt or significant change in the family structure the cat’s sensory perception absorbs those changes, and then behaves accordingly. Cats appreciate sameness, and consistency. If there is something on the horizon that promises to upset life’s balance and routine then this can become unsettling for cats.

One Halloween as we were getting ready for the seasons festivities, and not very aware that the family rituals we were about to celebrate might permanently and irreversibly change, I discovered Baba had gone missing. My two oldest were set to go away to school the following year so the family dynamic was definitely about to change. When I found BaBa he was dead, hidden away in the bushes. I dug a hole right there and placed him in it, covered him up with dirt and then placed three hay bales over him for a makeshift grave. Next, I placed a lit jack-o’-lantern on top of the hay bales and gathered the family.

There were six of us. A nuclear family: mom, dad, and four kids. I wasn’t expecting the cascade of emotions that poured forth at the time, like old faithful, but they came in a font of grief and loss, uncontrollable sobs. The children cried with unadulterated abandon, heartfelt loss for Baba and all he represented of an ideal past, a past which was just beginning to fade. Although not quite clear to us, these changes appear to be clear to cats. They recognize the change before it happens and recognize that the space they occupy can no longer be kept by them because they’ve served their purpose.

In 1960, nuclear families represented 45% of household formation. Today, that figure has plummeted to 19%. One can only imagine the stress and strain that our feline friends have endured under this seismic social shift in families. We ought to pay attention: #NationalCatDay

National Cat Day in the United States is on October 29!

International Cat Day happens soon, on August 8th.

In case you were wondering, National Family Day is celebrated on September 22nd.

Love your dogs! Love your cats! Love your people!

HVA

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