In Loving Memory of a Cat

Jesus, Socrates, and Buddha did not write their teachings, philosophies, and aha moments. They owe their stardom to the followers who penned for them.

So, today, I have also decided to write about a cat that does not care about being immortalized but is worthy of exaltation. Meow!


We met four years ago, a day before my graduation. It was dusk – a perfect time to tinker with my camera. While I was busy planning to take some snaps of vanity, that cap-and-saddle cat kept on meowing pitifully. She was bruised and perhaps hungry; her pain was screaming for attention. Our first meeting is obviously not a fond memory.

I opened the gate to our house for her, but she did not want to enter. She was clearly calling for me, yet she was too skittish to accept my care. Some hooligans might have hurt her so bad. How dare they! Even my signature closed-lip irresistible smile did not work to console her. In the end, when push came to shove, I had to use my greatest asset – my beautiful eyes. Ha! Wink-wink!


Seriously speaking, I mustered my patience, closed the gate, and just looked deeply in her narrow fearful pupils. I toned down my eagerness to do something. I just showed that I was there. She played hard to get, so I had to follow the backwards law: I became more effective at pacifying her when I stopped trying to. A few minutes later, her exasperation went way. The inner cat in me finally resonated.

In fact, she remembered that moment. She made regular visits in our house since then.

I even saw her peeking at me through the roof.

Picture3.jpg

It dawned on me that cats are not different from us in terms of surveying environments and of making decisions based on emotions. They feel. They can even experience trauma. Memories also serve and betray them.


Unbeknownst to the cat that I am fond of, she also has two selves: the experiencing self and the remembering self.


Currently, nobody is hurting her anymore. The experiencing self is already free from danger. However, the remembering self still drags her to fear. She does not only live in current experiences; her memories of past experiences also directs her.***


In this sense, cats have the same survival instincts as us, humans. They somehow prevent future disasters based on previous patterns. They become more cautious when other species proved themselves as threats, and they become more hospitable to those who showed care. With this ability, their memories can direct them to continue existing; otherwise, they will be out of the food chain.


However, unlike most of us, they live in the spirit of detachment to infinity.

Whatever cats do for survival, it is only limited to the span of their lives.


Whatever humans do for survival, it always involves transcending mortality.


As we create mass organization systems – families, empires, kingdoms, governments, corporations, and whatnot – the capacity of our memory improves concomitantly. We always ensure that our traditions and history will be passed on for posterity. In this way, the future members of our species can continue what we started. We always remain sedulous on transforming our memories into legacies.


While the memories of cats only lie inside their brain/mind, ours are also extended to books, diaries, journals, paintings, photos, films, televisions, radios, too numerous to mention…


While the meows of cats can only be communicated to those who share the same location as theirs, we have letters, emails, phones, websites, and social media applications to share what is in our mind, or to tweet what is happening.


My cat friend is contented on not having to record each moment of her life. She lives with memories, but she uses it to direct herself on living in the infinite nows of her existence. The traumatic past would always remain with her, but she is strong enough not to overly release it on tools and technologies that could immortalize her fear. She has full copyright on her own experiences; nobody but her can store, recreate, replay, and edit it.


She is like Jesus, Socrates, and Buddha who fully lived their best without being obsessed on documenting each moment. She belongs to the cadre of beings who are too busy to give focus and attention on what future accounts will say about them. Ironically, without any conscious effort to record diligently, it is these humble names that continuously echo all throughout eternity. Their followers just effortlessly flock without coercion to immortalize their wisdom because, unfortunately,


Quod non est in actis,
non est in mundo.
What is not kept in records
does not exist.

May this be in loving memory of a cat who really exists; in fact, who does not just really exist, but genuinely knows how to do it better than I.


Thank you for reminding me to ground myself right here, right now, at this moment in time; and for teaching me how to be anxious for the present, not just for the future.


***Kahneman, D. (2011). Thinking, Fast and Slow. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
 

Click my pic below to return at the Scribbles main page. *lol, judged*

Previous
Previous

Not Unteachable

Next
Next

Tick Tock