Luci's diary: getting to know my way around. And my family

Luci's Diary. She begins to learn the ropes. And gets to know the people round her a bit better.

End of March 2015

Wow, Misty, our cat, is just great! Isn’t he? I’m getting on really well with him these days. We’ve got a real rapport, I feel. Even if he still beats me up a bit. Well, a lot actually. But only when I’ve really stepped out of line and he needs to correct me.

We get on so well these days
He only beats me up when I really ask for it

And he’s just so exciting.

He wanders indoors and back out again without so much as a by your leave. All the comfortable places to sleep on are his by right (it took me a while to get my mind round that, but he’s very good at making things really, really clear). And, boy, he can jump! I thought I was good at it, but he’s so much better: his food is kept way up in the air, far out of my reach, but he just leaps up there to eat away.

Of course, he can get at my food too, and does, but it’s odd because the only time he doesn’t beat me up is when I push him away from my bowl when’s he’s trying it on. Could it be that he’s not altogether sure he’s being entirely honest? I like to think it’s just my tactful way of suggesting to him that the bowl’s mine and he really ought to move on. Perhaps show me how well he jumps again, to get at his own food.

There’s one thing I’ve worked out about him, though, where he’s not being quite as clever as I thought. There was a time I believed he could just walk straight though a solid, closed door. In from the garden. Silly me. It’s not like that at all. There’s a sort of flap in the door. You push it with your head from outside, and it opens up inwards and you can slip through.

I was really pleased when I worked that one out. Now I can get in myself if it gets a bit cold or wet, and they leave me outside on my own. Actually, even if it isn’t cold and wet: I don’t like being out on my own too long anyway.

But there’s still a trick I haven’t mastered. He seems to be able to get out through the door too. Smart operator. I haven’t sussed out how he does that. I can’t see another flap. Could it be magic after all? I wouldn’t put anything past our Misty.

The humans are fun too. She is, particularly. Tough, but you know, loving. Looks after me. Walks and all that. And food! She’s the one for food.

I spend more time with him, though. She clears off somewhere or other during the day, but he’s mostly there. So I can lie next to him. Get a lot of rest, actually. Mainly because he gets terribly shirty if I walk on his keyboard, and he seems to have a keyboard on his knees practically the whole time. Hits it with his fingers – you’d think it would hurt and he might stop after a while it. Why doesn’t he feel uncomfortable with it? I know I do. But, like I said, it’s no good telling him – he just gets irritated.

Still, he takes me for walks too. And I’m getting him reasonably trained: he takes me by car to the places we’re going to walk, instead of forcing me to get there along those nasty, smelly streets. Drives me to the park gates, you know, just as I like it. If he can just learn to give me food, he’ll be basically all right.

No better than all right yet, though. A couple of times he’s taken me to this dismal place. The house of lamentation, I call it. Full of unpleasant smells, lots of strange people, wailing dogs, even the odd cat I don’t know. There’s a weird woman there who takes me into a back room and does nasty things to me, prodding me and pushing me and even sometimes sticking needles in me.

Well, he took me there for the second time, just a few days ago. And afterwards, when he stuck me back in the car, it wasn’t to go home, it was to drive somewhere else. Driving for ages. Ages and ages. It made me throw up in the end, which I wasn’t very happy about, and nor was he when we stopped – which makes me wonder why we bothered at all, if it only put us both in a bad mood.

I got a couple of nice walks out of being wherever he took me, but no better than we usually have. Certainly not so much better that they were worth driving ages and ages for.

With such good places to walk near home,
why drive for ages and ages?

When we got back, we met up with her again – joy! – and we all went for another walk – double joy! – but then he started throwing a pine cone for me to chase.

After that day. Can you believe it? I was exhausted! The pummelling in the house of lamentation. And then all that driving. I had no energy left.

Still, I didn’t want to hurt his feelings. He was doing his best. So I fetched him his pine cone three times. But that, I thought, was enough. After the third time, I wandered off and pretended to be interested in some grass. He stopped throwing.

He’s nice enough, but he needs a bit more training. In empathy. And compassion.

It seems I still have some work to do…