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Tuesday, March 4, 2008
An amazing show....better than Cats!
8:31 PM | 
Posted by
Christine
The house is finally at peace tonight, and I'm tucked into my favorite corner of the couch. Outside, however, is the most blood-curdling sound - it's as if someone is killing babies in the trees.
There are two black cats that live in my neighborhood. Both, it seems, believe they rule the streets with unchecked authority. Tonight, as happens now and then, the two have crossed each others' paths. They tangle, screaming, with an eerie ferocity that turns a cold winter night into something vaguely sinister. I find it a disturbing way to end the evening.
That single-minded battle for dominance, however, is also fascinating. The willingness to fight and win at any cost is, in its own way, a certain sort of respectable. It's primal, instinctual, and very...
....alive.
It makes me ponder, as I sit waiting for the furnace to trip on and mask the racket outside, my own aversion to confrontation. Not at work, and not as a parent. Not in the ways I present myself to the world...but in the quieter, more personal matters in which I find myself less confident. So many times, with my father, my sister, and (not surprisingly) in certain relationships, I find it easier to say, "I won't argue. You win..." and I walk away before a challenge can be forged.
When exactly did I decide that it's better to duck out before trouble hits than to stick it out and take the risk of losing? What is is that I fear? It's certainly not a bit of blood, or a lingering limp. I've been beaten before, and have always survived. I think, regardless of how silly it seems, I have grown so attached to the fragile seed of dignity that has sprouted that I'd rather curl protectively around it than take a chance of having it trampled in the mayhem.
This in itself is unhealthy, I realize.
Everything I have, and everything I have worked toward is worth very little if I never stand up and say, "This is who I am, and this is what I want."
The next time I find myself with such a chance, I must try to stand my ground - and even push forward. Don't let me lose the struggle against myself...because really, I can't end up as the cat who smugly struts around her own tiny porch, proud to pronounce that she hasn't lost the territory inside her own perimeter.
And I hear that seeds of dignity are everywhere these days, anyway. How hard can it be to get my hands on a new one?
There are two black cats that live in my neighborhood. Both, it seems, believe they rule the streets with unchecked authority. Tonight, as happens now and then, the two have crossed each others' paths. They tangle, screaming, with an eerie ferocity that turns a cold winter night into something vaguely sinister. I find it a disturbing way to end the evening.
That single-minded battle for dominance, however, is also fascinating. The willingness to fight and win at any cost is, in its own way, a certain sort of respectable. It's primal, instinctual, and very...
....alive.
It makes me ponder, as I sit waiting for the furnace to trip on and mask the racket outside, my own aversion to confrontation. Not at work, and not as a parent. Not in the ways I present myself to the world...but in the quieter, more personal matters in which I find myself less confident. So many times, with my father, my sister, and (not surprisingly) in certain relationships, I find it easier to say, "I won't argue. You win..." and I walk away before a challenge can be forged.
When exactly did I decide that it's better to duck out before trouble hits than to stick it out and take the risk of losing? What is is that I fear? It's certainly not a bit of blood, or a lingering limp. I've been beaten before, and have always survived. I think, regardless of how silly it seems, I have grown so attached to the fragile seed of dignity that has sprouted that I'd rather curl protectively around it than take a chance of having it trampled in the mayhem.
This in itself is unhealthy, I realize.
Everything I have, and everything I have worked toward is worth very little if I never stand up and say, "This is who I am, and this is what I want."
The next time I find myself with such a chance, I must try to stand my ground - and even push forward. Don't let me lose the struggle against myself...because really, I can't end up as the cat who smugly struts around her own tiny porch, proud to pronounce that she hasn't lost the territory inside her own perimeter.
And I hear that seeds of dignity are everywhere these days, anyway. How hard can it be to get my hands on a new one?
1 comments:
Those cats were probably trying to have sex. Their mating ritual is very similiar to your own. Screaming, yowling and clawing. I've heard yours may be more brutal. Heh heh.