My Kitten's Right to Self Determination

By Cybele Werts
CybeleW@aol.com  
www.supertechnogirl.com 

One hour of right-down love is worth an age of dully living on.
~ Aphra Behn, England's first female professional writer

Last Fall my kitty Boca wandered off on a midnight sojourn and never returned. I knew he had died because in ten years he'd never left me for even a day. I had nightmares that instead of the deity-attributable death from raccoon or perhaps fox, that he instead came too quickly upon a car or person of ill repute. During the ten years I had Boca, I allowed, even encouraged him to go outside. While it's true that indoor cats live an average of sixteen years versus the ten or so for outdoor ones, I've always felt that better a short and radically happy life than a long dull one in the captivity of my apartment. My love and attention, no matter how wonderful, cannot compete with the allure of wild mint, fireflies, and dandy-lions.

Today in the same backyard that Boca passed through the very last time before facing his demise, my other cat Program frolics. Program has a penchant for field mice so that even after fifteen years (she's living on borrowed time beyond her allotted outdoor decade) she still drags in an alarming number of wriggling squealing mice. After she lets them go – once she's inside of course – they rush madly about until I rescue them with a fast-moving trash pail. I've always wondered if the stress of my chasing them resulted in a mousy heart attack, which would in effect have negated my rescue efforts.

Today, my new kitten Lucy made her first foray outside where her tiny lawnmower purr can be heard at thirty paces. She simply cannot decide between the smell of the fresh mown grass, the breeze ruffling her fluffy tail, or the butterflies leading her on a merry dance. She is in kitty heaven, in the "Catskill Mountains" where "the birds are found right on the ground and the mice run very slowly."* When I think about it, I imagine Boca being there too, stretching out on a "high plateau where the catnip grows" and taking a lazy and languid nap.

I believe that God made the outdoors for the supreme pleasure of my kitties and me. More importantly, to deprive Lucy of this supreme pleasure would immeasurably diminish her life, and mine. This is why I send her out to play despite my grief over having lost Boca in exactly this manner.

This is not just about kittens though. It's about my right as a person to choose my own way and about the risks you take in doing that. Fundamentally, I believe that no one can make better decisions for me than myself because only I can see the whole picture of my life, inside my heart and mind and out. Only I can know what God's path is for me. It's naturally skewed by my limited perspective I know, but it is still surely more complete than anyone outside could ever see, no matter how much they love me.

Self determination also means that I have to take responsibility for my own life choices. For example, I chose to live in Vermont, my spiritual place, and I am dead set on staying here. But I recognize that this decision also limits my life in various ways such as in the generally lower salaries here. Is it worth it to me? You bet it is, but only when I keep in mind the reasons I want to live here. While a few things in life just "happen" to us, like Boca getting eaten by a wild Vermont something, the majority of our life happens because we made it happen. Our efforts to develop a career, build a home, create a family or even write a column are directly related to our own choices about how we will live this life.

Like Lucy, I would rather live a short and radically happy life than a long dull one in captivity. I'd rather spend my time with the wild mint, fireflies, and dandy-lions than live a long life not ever having raised my head above the crowd. It's true that popping up so high quite often gets me shot at, but better the risk of that than the alternative of being borne on lost in the crowd. If it turns out that one day I wander off on a midnight sojourn and never return, then it will be the result of a life well lived, and well ended.

Lucy at 12 Weeks, June 2004

A Dandy-Lion

SOURCES

Pictures of my Pets

Words to Garrison Keillor's Song "Out in the Catskill Mountains:"
From his CD "Songs of the Cat"
 
Oh, the fresh catfish in the china dish
Where the cream flows from the fountain
On the high plateaus where the catnip grows
Out in the Catskill Mountains.
 
Out in the Catskill Mountains
The land of the big feed trough
The couches all are comfortable
And no one kicks you off.
The dogs are taught to honor cats
As beautiful and holy
And the birds are found right on the ground
And the mice run very slowly
 
Out in the Catskill Mountains
Fresh tuna just appears
And people beg you for the chance
To scratch behind your ears.
A cat can lie flat on its back
And never be ambitious
Where the grass is sweet beneath your feet
and the house plants are delicious!



Copyright 2004

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