26.11.2021
They slink away. They ignore you. They seem thoroughly unimpressed with your presence. This is the typical cat on the street in England.
Although I’ve never really been permitted to have a pet, I have done a bit of light reading on the subject of cat psychology, part of my general interest in our animal sisters and brothers and their minds. I used to try and blink at them on the streets as I understood this was a form of greeting with them. However, I never got much of a response. The English cat is highly anti-social.
However, compare the stray cat in Abu Dhabi with our native species. Once beloved pets, these animals had been callously left behind in the country when the ex-pats found their visas or their appetite for the country had run out.
These cats would follow me around, meowing pathetically for my attention. One would find them wandering around by themselves or in packs of five or six. They looked visibly malnourished, although kind people would leave out food for them. They would stare at me, with a deep longing in their eyes.
On one occasion, I found that one of these stray cats had ambushed a small family gathering in the park in front of the apartment I was at. It was actively performing for the delight of two young children. This black and white creature was playing dead, lying on its back with its paws up in the air, listening to the children’s squeals of delight.
These stray cats, once used to receiving human love and an audience, now craved an audience of humans. They would actively seek out an opportunity to perform and to receive some kind of acknowledgement from human beings. Those that had once given them food, shelter, nourishment, care, love.
The cat, seemingly so aloof in England, seems to be a slave of love, just as we are. This sheds light on a mammalian need for affection as well as the dynamics of inter-species connection. To me, the observation also suggests the roots of the need to perform for an audience. Perhaps, the performer is a being that has been starved of affection, or who has the greatest hunger for it. When the cat has companionship and the treasures that go with it, they don’t feel a need to perform for strangers. However, when this sense of society is gone, then an evolutionary instinct seems to kick in and drives the behaviour of the mammalian mind to seek out strangers, and with them, sympathy and the formation of potential relationships. Really, I think, our mind is controlled by our circumstances, especially our circumstances of love. And could this be what is foundational for all our cultural endeavours which seek to find affection from strangers, such as acting, painting, making music and writing?
diary of a lone man 