Hello, two-legged readers! Lucinda the literate cat brings you another post. My CCL (Cantankerous Cat Lady) tells me it’s time I earned my keep, so have decided to explain how a cat sees Christmas.
You Seem To Love Labeling Everything
Of course, we cats don’t put labels on our days like you two-leggeds like to do. You label everything, starting by giving each day for 7 days a new name, and calling it a week. Every 7 days you start a new one of these weeks.
Then you bunch about 30 days together and call that a month, and give it another new name. How confusing!
Then you come up with names for certain special days, calling them birthdays or anniversaries or holidays, or some other title. You consider Christmas to be one of these holidays.
Now, we cats see every day as the same as any other day. We might differentiate days, but in different ways: One day we may get to spend a lot of time outdoors, or we might get a special treat, or we just don’t feel well. We don’t plan ahead for such days, as we live in the moment.
Christmas Is Special
But, Christmas? We notice this one day because you make it such a big deal. It’s just one day like any other, but you want to mark it as extraordinary, so you start many days ahead of time preparing for it.
You go out and buy gifts for people (sometimes even for us.) Then you wrap them up in shiny paper with lots of colorful designs, and you tie them up with ribbons.
These ribbons would make great cat toys! The packages look so special. It seems to me that the package often looks nicer than what is inside. Too bad you have to open it.
We do enjoy participating in the wrapping process, though at times we sense that our help is not appreciated.
A Real Tree! Is That For Us?
Then, wonder of wonders, you bring a real tree from outdoors into the house. Now the whole Christmas celebration becomes more real to us. We see that tree and think you must have brought it in to share with us.
To make it even more exciting: You string the tree with lights and paper silver ribbons called icicles, though they don’t seem very icy to me. Another of your imaginary creations!
You hang the most wonderful toys all over the tree. We especially like the shiny balls of different colors. But, when we try to climb in the tree or play with the toys you’ve hung there, you chase us away.
Why? You have created this miracle by bringing a bit of the outside world in, but you won’t let us get close to your miracle.
Why does the tree now reside in the house if we are not allowed to experience it? To really know that tree, we need to touch it; smell it; taste it; climb around in it.
You two-leggeds don’t seem to understand at all. You just want to look at that tree! You can’t experience that tree just by gazing at it.
What? Now You Want To Sing?
Then, though you might not sing a single note all the rest of the time before and after Christmas, you seem to feel the need to create music around this special time. Your singing does not quite compare to ours, but it is pleasant, and you seem to enjoy it…so why don’t you sing together more often?
Something Called Religion
When the day you call Christmas actually arrives, we can see that you really go all-out to make this day special. I’m told it has something to do with your religious beliefs. You say that religion teaches you how to become the best two-legged you can be.
We cats don’t use such teachings to try to become better cats. We don’t really look much at the future, so we don’t see a need to be better. We just behave as we’ve learned to behave, mostly from our mothers. We take each day as it comes, one day at a time.
Oh, but we do really like some parts of your Christmas. When you each open your gifts, you often tear packages open with wild abandon. You become excited just as we do when playing with our favorite toys.
And the pretty paper and ribbons now become public property. As you tear the packages open, we can play in all that lovely debris!
You Do Know How To Put On A Feast
The other thing we really enjoy about your Christmas has to do with the food you prepare. Even though many of your special dishes would not interest us much, if at all, if you bake a turkey, then we get excited!
We normally get some tastes of that wonderful turkey meat, and truly feel then that we have been included in the festivities.
I do feel we benefit when you celebrate Christmas, because so much joy and laughter seems to come from you. Because you show happiness, we, too, are happy.
Let’s Hear It For The Christmas Spirit
In fact, I have observed that, very often during the Christmas season, you two-leggeds seem to become mellow and forgiving. You seem to find more to make you happy, and you also appear to appreciate your friends and family more.
Can’t you find a way to keep this happy, caring attitude all the year, and not just at Christmas? On the other hand, it’s a good thing you celebrate Christmas, because you seem to forget for a short time all the bad and hurtful things you tend to do to each other.
Can’t you find a way to keep that loving spirit in your heart for the whole year? What you call the “Christmas spirit” seems like something that would be useful for every day of the year.
