I guess my mom emailed me last night that I noticed and read this morning that one of the family cats at my grandma’s house died again in less than six months after the other one had to be put down.
I would’ve had a harder time processing it than I did David Bowie dying suddenly and without warning except I recognized the warning signs she was going to die soon months in advance so I’ve had time to accept the fact she was going to die while she was still alive. I guess this is the nature of life that it has to end some time.
It’s still sad though that I know now when I go over there she’s not gonna be running up excited to greet me purring any longer. I guess if I end up getting more mentally unstable soon you’ll all know why.
Diabetes is a pretty crap way to have to go through really. I’ve seen what it does to people with it who don’t even try to take care of themselves after they get it. With cats I’m sure it’s way harder to care for them once they get it because they can’t just tell you they feel weird and you have to keep an eye on them constantly and such and they have no awareness something is medically wrong with them as a concept so they don’t do anything to change their habits especially since it can’t be explained to them. Sorry to hear that happened for you too.
I told my cat one of her buddies she knew her whole life up until we moved out a few months ago had died even though I know she doesn’t understand English well enough to get any meaning out of it. I think just the fact I talk to her about anything makes her feel more included in my life. I already gave her a can of wet cat food for this week and she came and tracked me down when I woke up today I guess because she noticed and wanted petted for 10 minutes which is kinda cool of her because most cats just wake you up if they want something.
This is the same with my cats. I talk to them, and so they try to talk back to me. My favorite ever cat figured he was a person, sat on his own chair at the table for dinner, asked to look at things in my hands and expected to be indulged. My cats throughout time have always been pretty sure they can negotiate with me successfully, probably because I talk and listen to them.
I’m pretty sure they learn on their own what some words mean by paying attention to us talking to other people or people who think out loud because I know they can be taught to do tricks on vocal command like a dog if done right so they surely can understand single words or a string of them together like dogs but neither of them are really able to understand the sentences like we can.
Yeah, Gus understands SNAX. We have a game where he has to hunt for treats, and if someone says SNAX, he immediately begins hunting in his favorite spots.
But they understand tone of voice, gestures, body language better. My cat Claude had issues with using the litter box, so whenever she did, I would exclaim happily and praise her for it. After a little while of this, whenever she would use it, she would come running excitedly to me in another room to let me know. It was very sweet.
Yeah that’s because they communicate primarily through body language and I think they can actually do it enough to rival sign language if you ignore the fact they probably can’t do things with it like debating the meaning of life. I’ve lived around cats all my life and noticed they tend to look at what they’re thinking of and I’ve seen them seem to communicate to each other ideas more complex than we give them credit for if it all wasn’t just coincidence.
My sister’s dog also knows “ball” means any round toy he has but he won’t do anything unless you say “go find the” before it and he doesn’t really respond if you just say that. I thought it was kinda interesting because it’s a very rudimentary version of how we put meaning to sentences.
And it honestly makes me mad when people act like other animals are a lower form of life because they probably have concepts we can’t even be aware of or understand like we have TVs and they probably have no clue what anything going on on them means.