On Tue, 4 Apr 2017 18:54:25 -0400, jmcquown wrote:

My father didn't like cats at all. He always felt there
was something sneaky about them. No cats allowed!

My dad always claimed he hated cats. He told me that at one point he and my
mother lived in the Bronx and in the summer it was so hot and muggy out you had
to leave the windows open even at night, and "The blankety-blank alleycats would
climb up the fire escape and come right in the window...two or three o'clock in
the morning they'd wake me up walking around on the bed and I thought I was
gonna have a heart attack."

Despite that, the first time he came over to my house when I had Charlie (RB),
my big Russian Blue, Dad and I were sitting on the couch and Charlie jumped up
at the end Dad was at, intending to walk across dad's lap to me - but when he
got onto Dad's lap, Dad started scratching him behind his ears. Charlie loved
being scratched behind his ears more than anything else, so as soon as Dad
started doing it he laid down on Dad's lap and squinted his eyes shut and began
purring up a storm - the perfect picture of solid contentment. Eventually he
fell asleep and Dad just sat there on the couch scratching the sleeping kitty
behind the ears for half an hour or longer. This was 40+ years later, so maybe
he mellowed out about cats as he got older, or maybe he simply discovered that a
purring cat lying in your lap isn't relaxing only to the cat - but he sure made
Charlie happy, and every time Dad came over after that Charlie would jump up on
Dad's lap as soon as Dad sat down and the whole scene was repeated.

John D. Kasupski
Niagara Falls, NY