CAT TALES &#8211; Cats, flags and Father&#8217;s Day

Yesterday I put up the Father’s Day flag. I am taking down and hoisting flags at a great rate during May, June, and July. First there’s the Mother’s Day Flag, quickly replaced by my birthday flag, which is taken down right away to make room for the Memorial Day flag. This flag stays up for D-Day and does double duty, which eases the bursitis I’m getting from these constant flag drills. Next was the Father’s Day flag which I hoisted yesterday. Then I have another breather until the American flag takes its place for the 4 th of July. A gal could miss a lot

of fitness exercises just by substituting flag raising and lowering for a few bends and squats.

Nurse Judy, my critical alter ego, disagrees with me on this. “You couldn’t do enough flag exercise to help your flabby figure,” she says.

As usual, she hurts my feelings, but I choose to ignore her and turn my attention to the cats, who enjoy all the flag business immensely. When I open the flag chest, they are right there, jumping in the middle of the pile of flags and trying to scratch them up into little sleeping nests.

What they accomplish, however, is just making a tangled mess, making the whole process harder for me. This doesn’t deter them in what they consider their job as helpmates.

Once I’m able to disentangle the mess enough to get out the appropriate flag, they immediately turn their attention to the chosen one. They must sit on it, lie on it -even lick it. This particular flag is exactly the one they’ve been waiting for. They love it to death and refuse to budge.

I know exactly what you’re thinking. I may be old and a bit feeble, but I am higher on the evolutionary scale than felines. I am bigger and stronger than they are. I have the ability to solve problems and use tools. Cats do not have these abilities. It should be easy for me to dislodge them in no time.

That just isn’t so. I’m not sure why. Perhaps, it’s because Beebe is so fat, it is hard to get a grip on him. Perhaps, it’s because Momau is so quick, I can’t pin her down fast enough.

Perhaps it’s because they both have claws which become entangled in everything (including my skin) increasing, instead of decreasing, the muddle. I also must leave from time to time to get antiseptic and band-aids for my wounds.

You think I’m kidding about all this, but I’m not. This is the struggle I have with flag raising, as well as bed making, and any other jobs they feel they need to assist with. I did get the Father’s Day flag up. It wasn’t easy. It took several attempts to even lift it without having an orange cat dangling from it, claws determinedly holding on. There was no hope of even beginning to lift it with Beebe hooked on. He is just too heavy.

I breathed a sigh of relief when that Father’s Day flag was finally fluttering in the breeze.

I had accomplished my holiday task once again. I patted myself on the back.

It wasn’t until I entered the house that I thought about what still lay before me. There were flags for summer, fall, Seminole games, beach days, Halloween. Thanksgiving, Christmas.

There was just no end to the Conlin flag collection.

Was I up to the job of carrying on this tradition? Would my wounds heal between raisings? Would the cats grow out of this playfulness before I gave out? I puzzled over this. I finally had an idea.

The Father’s Day flag was up. WE were celebrating Father’s Day. Fathers are problem solvers. Fathers can fix things. Fathers have good ideas. Fathers can do anything to keep a home happy. I send all fathers thanks and good wishes on this holiday. I also issue them a challenge. Please invent a flag that covers all holidays. I’d be eternally grateful.

More later, Judy and the Cats - www.nursejudyinfo.com

CAT TALES – Cats, flags and Father’s Day

Gadsden County Times – Legals – 6/13

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