Since I was a kid, I have a nice feeling with animals. Instead of barking at me, dogs come to me with their tail waving and happy to see me (with one or two exceptions, but it happens). And while cats continue with their usual life, after seeing me enough times, they sometimes approach me for a quick pat before moving away. So it isn't a surprise that I appreciate their company.
However, things are obviously different when you're switching from petting random animals to get your own. There are things to take care of, and you need to be sure your pet is raised with all the care and the love you can give. Even when they're the worst assholes you've ever encountered. A recent law in Belgium relates animals to children in regards to responsibility, and in my opinion, you should treat them as such.
Actually, I have two cats at home. And they're so different in the way they act that it's sometimes funny to see them together, despite both of them living in more or less the same conditions but with a single change that makes everything different. Both were stray kittens who were abandoned by their mother at the very moment they stopped to need milk, but both were too weak to endure life in general when I met them. And both look more or less the same, being black cats, with the only difference being the younger one having a white mark on the chest.
The older one, Kage, was found in a bin alongside his five brothers and sisters. It was decided among neighbours that each of us would take a kitten and raise it, and I took the weakest one since I was worried at his health. He grew nicely, but developed a classic tsundere attitude, only accepting petting when he asks for them, and only showing worry for others when they're genuinely either ill or weak.
The younger one, Bagheera, was found at my building's cellar along side his older brother and the dead bodies of his other brothers and sisters, with no trace of a mother around. Worse, his mother had an illness related to a worm that attacks the neural system, and transmitted it to him, making him weak and with no control of his rear paws, which he surprisingly counterbalanced by using his tail as a third rear paw of sorts.
Said illness was taken care of in time, and while he was forbidden to go out during his childhood (too weak, too risky), he's now able to live a normal cat life. Except he still has no control of his rear side outside of his tail, which means no control over his stool, and thus that he can endure much less than another cat before pissing or shitting. Plus, he sleepwalks, so he sometimes wets his bed while sleeping.
However, I tended to him so much and cared for his well-being so much that he developed an attitude that is closer to a dog than to a cat. Always wanting attention, petting and even hugs, always trying to stay at my side, always trying to sleep close to me, and even his meows sometimes look more like barks than anything else. It's easy to see in his attitude how he knows his life would have been much shorter without my intervention, and how he wants to thank me every day for that.
In the end, both of them enjoy the other's presence. Bagheera often goes to see his big brother for a quick lick before coming back at my side, and Kage often shows his softer side when his younger brother has a rear problem, which are particularly cute interactions you don't see that much. And with both of them now being more than 10 years old (13 for Kage, 11 for Bagheera), I expect to have them at my side for the rest of their lives. I'll probably mourn them once they'll be gone, but I'm more than happy to know that their life was safe, calm and full of happiness.
However, things are obviously different when you're switching from petting random animals to get your own. There are things to take care of, and you need to be sure your pet is raised with all the care and the love you can give. Even when they're the worst assholes you've ever encountered. A recent law in Belgium relates animals to children in regards to responsibility, and in my opinion, you should treat them as such.
Actually, I have two cats at home. And they're so different in the way they act that it's sometimes funny to see them together, despite both of them living in more or less the same conditions but with a single change that makes everything different. Both were stray kittens who were abandoned by their mother at the very moment they stopped to need milk, but both were too weak to endure life in general when I met them. And both look more or less the same, being black cats, with the only difference being the younger one having a white mark on the chest.
The older one, Kage, was found in a bin alongside his five brothers and sisters. It was decided among neighbours that each of us would take a kitten and raise it, and I took the weakest one since I was worried at his health. He grew nicely, but developed a classic tsundere attitude, only accepting petting when he asks for them, and only showing worry for others when they're genuinely either ill or weak.
The younger one, Bagheera, was found at my building's cellar along side his older brother and the dead bodies of his other brothers and sisters, with no trace of a mother around. Worse, his mother had an illness related to a worm that attacks the neural system, and transmitted it to him, making him weak and with no control of his rear paws, which he surprisingly counterbalanced by using his tail as a third rear paw of sorts.
Said illness was taken care of in time, and while he was forbidden to go out during his childhood (too weak, too risky), he's now able to live a normal cat life. Except he still has no control of his rear side outside of his tail, which means no control over his stool, and thus that he can endure much less than another cat before pissing or shitting. Plus, he sleepwalks, so he sometimes wets his bed while sleeping.
However, I tended to him so much and cared for his well-being so much that he developed an attitude that is closer to a dog than to a cat. Always wanting attention, petting and even hugs, always trying to stay at my side, always trying to sleep close to me, and even his meows sometimes look more like barks than anything else. It's easy to see in his attitude how he knows his life would have been much shorter without my intervention, and how he wants to thank me every day for that.
In the end, both of them enjoy the other's presence. Bagheera often goes to see his big brother for a quick lick before coming back at my side, and Kage often shows his softer side when his younger brother has a rear problem, which are particularly cute interactions you don't see that much. And with both of them now being more than 10 years old (13 for Kage, 11 for Bagheera), I expect to have them at my side for the rest of their lives. I'll probably mourn them once they'll be gone, but I'm more than happy to know that their life was safe, calm and full of happiness.
