Cohousing-L Mailing List: RE: Cats. Wow!

[Forbes Jan (jan.forbes]

Wow indeed Aliciana.  

Like others on this list I'm used to living with cats and the house doesn't
feel right without at least two about the house.  At present I have one
fifteen year old male cat and a male and female eleven months old.  All are
neutered.  Why I have three is a long story.  One died and I replaced her
with a seven month old who after four months with us was hit by a car.  I
felt responsible.  I'd let her out at night because she asked to go out.  

I decided a kitten would be less likely to wander away from home.  He's as
cute as Tom Kitten and very playful.  The older cat was upset by all the
attention so, at the vet's suggestion, I got my kitten a playmate his own
age.  It's a delight to watch them play and they've become inseparable
companions.  They sleep entwined.  

They are happy cats.  They seem tuned in to me.  When I'm at home they
mostly come and sit near or on me. They know my daily routine which is to
let them out briefly in the morning and early evening before dark.  They
seem to understand and respect it.  Perhaps this explains why I have no
trouble getting them to come inside and stay inside.  

Our house has high ceilings so there's plenty of air inside and some windows
to watch birds through.

It seems fashionable at present for some people to be anti-cats and other
domestic pets at all costs, on environmental grounds.  While I care about
the environment and do my best to preserve and respect it, I regard this is
a hard and uncompromising view that leaves no room for individual
circumstances such as the environments where people live and how they manage
their animals.  IMHO this sort of extreme view virtually makes cats and dogs
the enemy, much as the Nazis did to the Jews and as such is a form of
paranoia.  

Provided what people do is within the law and their pets are not harming the
environment or interfering with how others choose to live their lives I
believe that people in cohousing ought to be left to make their own choices
about the pets they keep.




Jan
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