I have two Cornish Rex cats who are now twelve years old, and a female weimaraner who is eleven but really 77 in dog years. For all intents and purposes, these creatures are my furry children. They are so much a part of the fabric of my life that I don't know how I will survive when they are called to their rewards.
The past four months have been hellish, what with my mother's illness and then a strange somewhat debilitating illness of my own. Extraneous complaints and cravings in life have sort of fallen away for me during this time. I find myself repeating in my head like a mantra that health is a gift. A wonderful and enlightened person once told me that we should look at life as though we are spiritual beings having an earthly experience as opposed to the other way around. I like this perspective; it opens the universe to me and helps me see that we are all connected in some way, shape, or form, that earthly possessions and desires actually pale in comparison when one views existence like this. But it's so hard to remember that you are first and foremost a spiritual being when your physical body is falling apart. I think in order for humans to be harmonious on this planet, we need to strike a perfect balance between the earthly and the spiritual. We need to care for our bodies as much as we nourish our souls.Anyway this is a long drawn out way of saying, this morning, my boy kitty was lying in my lap. His eyes were half slitted in that contented way cats have; his front paws were stretched out and pressing into my belly, and he was purring, purring, purring. I ran my fingernails down his spine and his eyes closed as he purred ever more deeply, and it struck me that touch is not only pleasurable, but essential, and probably the simplest way we can connect with one another. Animals have cut the crap, really. All they want is food, and a warm place to sleep, and touch, and exercise, and to be with their people. They are ahead of us in the body/soul department.
"Hi, baby boy," I said to Piper, running my nails down his spine a second time.
He responded by giving me a slow blink and kneading his paws further into my belly. Purring the whole time.
