October 5, 2004
Dancing
The big yellow neighborhood cat that hangs out around the bird bath and feeder was being obnoxious again. He was in one of the flower beds pawing and wrestling with something, his hind quarters in my direction. I figured he’d caught one of the finches and was quickly dispatching it.
So I looked through my binoculars only to see that he had caught nothing, yet was carrying on like he was doing the east Texas two-step. Ever so often, he’d bat at a plant, then rub it with his jowl, then shinny alongside of it, then wander away rather aimlessly.
We don’t dance much, let alone do the two-step, but we do try to run a twelve-step shop on account of my onetime more wayward days. It wasn’t until I watched the feline intruder’s behavior that I remembered CP telling me she’d recently transplanted some Nepeta cataria (aka catnip) in the yard.
She said a friend gave it to her, and that gardeners always plant each other’s gifts, as it would be insulting not to. I suggested AlAnon. She said for me to take my own inventory and work my own program.