Power Struggle

I sometimes wonder who is in charge at home; me or Kokoro, my obstinate, ebony-coated, 17 pound, stub-tailed feline.  We’d been engaged in a battle of wills for months.  Fearing for the straw tatami mats that lined my living room floor, I felt that this room should be off limits to Kokoro while I was at work and could not supervise him.  Needless to say, Kokoro felt otherwise.  

Being too smart for his own good, he figured out how to slide the wooden door just far enough open to allow his generous berth to pass through.  I would come home and find him napping on the living room sofa, smug smile plastered across his furry face even in sleep.  

As the superior intelligence, I felt I had the responsibility to prevail over my cat.  Examining the door mechanics, I jammed a pencil under the sliding door to wedge it firmly in place.  There, now Kokoro would not be able to move the door at all.

Imagine my surprise when I came home and found the pencil rolling on the floor and Kokoro again napping on the living room sofa.  Is it common for cats to understand the laws of physics?  Because mine had figured out how to remove the pencil wedge so that the door would slide over.

As a last resort, I yanked the door off the frame and leaned it up against the doorway.  At last, I knew Kokoro would not be able to slide the door if it were standing on the ground.  Oh, how wrong I was.  I came home to find the door knocked over and Kokoro again sleeping on the sofa.

Maybe it wasn’t so important for Kokoro to stay out of the living room after all.   

About a month passed, and I determined that Kokoro needed to be neutered.  I was afraid he would begin spraying the furniture as he got older.  After speaking with our local vet, we set the day and time for the operation.  I was given strict instructions in Japanese not to feed Kokoro for 14 hours prior to his appointment.

Heeding the vet’s advice, I did not give Kokoro breakfast on the morning of his operation, although Kokoro protested this loudly.  He must have been very angry with me.  When I came home, I was astounded to find my petulant cat, bloated amongst a sea of shrimp shells and empty plastic treat bags.  How had he gotten them down?  They were lodged atop the 8 foot refrigerator and no other footholds were nearby.  Did Kokoro learn to do magic while I was gone?  The answers evaded me.

The vet scolded me for letting my cat eat prior to his appointment, so Kokoro was not able to undergo surgery as planned.  We made another appointment for the following day, and I prayed that I could keep my resourceful feline out of trouble until then.