Rocky has his holidays on the Riviera. He has a personal trainer and his foster parents cater to his every fancy. Not too bad when you consider that Rocky is all of 3 and a dog at that. Why then do we, human beings, most of whom settle for far less, complain about working like a dog, and when exhausted by the sweltering heat, call it “dog days”?
When did mankind’s obsession with pets begin? Perhaps the day he started to domesticate wild animals? The Old Testament character Balaam must have been shocked beyond imagination when his pet ass talked back, but animal lovers would contend that he had it coming. The donkey had taken more harassment than it could, before returning the flak! If today’s pet cats and dogs were to talk about what they heard at home, I suspect that their owners would have been mortified. Some owners may even be dragged to court by their friends for damaging their reputations. Through the millennia man and canines have been together, we’ve tinkered with the blood lines and moulded the morphology to our benefit, so much so that there are over 400 varieties of dogs. As for pet cats, there are over 30 varieties and man has even crossbred them with their wilder and sturdier cousins. Though experts assure you that the crossbreeds have sweet temperaments, I wouldn’t like to take a chance with one. At any rate, with a price tag of 20K dollars, I am out of the league. Modern day moguls and rajahs — those are the kind of people who can afford to flaunt exotic pets, and I should imagine that there is no dearth for them in the post- liberalisation era.
All I could afford was a stray cat my son brought from the streets. He took as much care of it as one would a newborn baby. The kitten recuperated gradually, her frame put on some flesh, and her meows became louder. It refused to have anything to do with me except during meal times, despite my overtures. Many a time I had this eerie feeling that the cat was sizing me up with those lustrous eyes. When I stared back, thin lines of contempt ran down from the corners of its mouth. I did not fail to note that this was not the way she reacted to my wife and son. Here was a feline who knew full well which side of the bread is buttered. The only light moment came when we were watching the Discovery Channel and a pack of wild dogs appeared on screen. The cat arched her back, her whiskers bristled, and she bolted in panic.
I soon suspected something nefarious was happening behind our backs — a tale of seduction and treachery as it turned out. What else could explain her prolonged absence from the house? Or the smug “cat that swallowed a canary” looks? Even the yowls of a tomcat which I thought I imagined in that half awake state? One fine day she deserted us, never to return.
Wasn’t it Ogden Nash who said “The trouble with a kitten is that it becomes a cat”? Yes, my family got smitten by a kitten, a case in point.