My Spirit Animal

Always I’ve been drawn to . . . cats. I’ll see cute yapping puppies in a pet store. They just don’t appeal to me as much as the cute quiet kitty in the corner - that cat which I can stare at for many minutes, wondering what she’s thinking as she looks back at me. Some cats which I “lived with” (you don’t really OWN a cat) would stare back at me for a long time. I wondered if I was having some kind of silent communion with them. Was it their way of showing me respect? Adoration? Casual interest? Nothing? I wish I knew. The cat is mysterious, with those big dark orbs staring out from the night’s shadows. I surely do love a good mystery! Quiet is the cat, and like me, often a loner that loves her independence! I recall my favorite cat that lived eighteen years in my house. Affection she would show, but it was a quiet more meaningful affection with soft nuzzling in the morning as she woke me to be fed. Smart was my cat. . . and persistent. She would get what she wanted! My spirit animal I think must be a cat, for also like the cat, I am unafraid to know darkness. The dark is folding in on the world now. I dig and dig sometimes like a desperate caged feline, wildly clawing to uncover in earth’s dirt - its black secrets. I cannot sit like a Persian perched in lovely fluffy silence on a pillow. A more aggressive kind of cat I need to be. - not letting life’s mysteries stay hidden in the slits of my green eyes. Like the panther of my youth – fast and agile - I now cannot so easily be. More like the dangerous courageous lioness - which in my life I’ve so rarely been - I will need to learn to fight. Though a sweet harmless house cat I long to remain, may my spirit animal protect me in the battle that is coming. Like the cat, I am curious . . . far too curious. I pray I still have left inside me at least a few more of my nine lives! June 3, 2020 for Dear Heart's Spirit Animal Contest