Ridiculous Opinions #162
Let me tell you about my favorite cat.
I’m telling you this in confidence, because if the two cats that I actually own were to find out that they were not my favorite cats, they would pee on our furniture (which they do anyway, but I digress).
The cat that you see above is my favorite cat. I call it Zen-Cat.
Tracey and I walk to school every morning. And for the last few mornings, about midway through our journey, we encounter Zen-Cat. Every time we walk by, Zen-Cat is sitting there, facing the sun, with its eyes closed. In the instance above, you can see it sitting on the petiole of the palm tree behind him.
(Yes, I did use the term Petiole in that sentence. Are you not entertained?)
And every time we walk past Zen-Cat, I think, How utterly perfect.
How glorious it is for this cat to be sitting there, every day, warming itself in the morning sun. It seems like the ultimate way to start the day.
To do list:
Wake up
Sit facing the sun until I feel warmed-up
Fight other cats
Forage for food
Go to bed
Repeat
Tracey, of course, has to hear me talk about Zen-Cat every morning, where I wax rhapsodic about how much I love this cat!
“Isn’t that great?” I say. “I can’t even begin to express how great that is! To just sit there, every morning, staring at the sun! I love this cat!”
As she listens to me, she humors my weird obsession and then probably mutters under her breath about what a pretentious idiot she married.
This cat doesn’t give us the time of day as we walk by. It doesn’t look at us. It doesn’t cower in fear. It doesn’t even open its eyes. It’s always just sitting there, with zero interest in anything other than staring at the sun, feeling warm, and enjoying its morning.
We have, on occasion, seen its cat-buddies sitting behind it, also warming themselves.
“Hey, what are you doing?”
“Warming myself in the sun. You should try it.”
“Okay!”
(Pause in the sun for a few minutes)
“This is boring. Let’s go fight other cats and make sounds like children screaming bloody murder.”
This does not phase Zen-Cat. Zen-Cat cannot be phased. Zen-Cat only cares about the warmth of the sun and sitting in a dignified position every morning.
And every time I walk by Zen-Cat, I wish that I could achieve that level of zen. To sit back and have nothing to do but live in the moment; to be present to the glories of the universe unfolding in front of me. Is there anything more wonderful than sitting on the grass in the early morning, the air with just a touch of a chill, your eyes closed but filled with the amber light of the sun shining through your eyelids?
Perhaps we have been thinking about reincarnation the wrong way. We aren’t reborn as higher beings. We are reborn into simplicity. And when we ultimately achieve enlightenment, we will be staring into the sun on some random day, enjoying the warmth of existence, with absolutely nothing better to do than just close our eyes and take in the glory of everything that exists.
And in that moment, we will all be Zen-Cat.
