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Children, Cats and Dogs
Taken from a handout by Corrie Lynne Player
“I just realized that while children are dogs – loyal and affectionate, teenagers are cats.”
It’s so easy to be a dog owner. You feed it, train it, boss it around. It puts its head on your knee and gazes at you as if you were a Rembrandt painting. It bounds indoors with enthusiasm when you call it.
Then, around age 13, your adoring puppy turns into a big old cat. When you tell it to come inside, it looks amazed, as if wondering who died and made you an emperor.
Instead of dogging your footsteps, it disappears. You won’t see it again until it gets hungry. Then it pauses on its sprint through the kitchen long enough to turn up its nose at whatever you are serving ….. swishing its tail and giving you an aggrieved look until you break out the tuna again.
When you reach out to ruffle its head in that old affectionate gesture, it twists away from you, then gives you a blank stare as if it is trying to remember where it has seen you before.
You, not realizing your dog is now a cat, think something must be desperately wrong with it. It seems so antisocial, so distant, sort of depressed. It won’t go on family outings. Since you’re the one who raised it, taught it to fetch, stay and sit on command, you assume you did something wrong. Flooded with guilt and fear, you redouble your efforts to make your pet behave.
Only now you’re dealing with a cat, so everything that worked before now has the opposite result. Call it, and it runs away. Tell it to sit, and it jumps on the counter. The more you go toward it, wringing your hands, the more it moves away.
Instead of continuing to act like a dog owner, you must learn to behave like a cat owner. Put a dish of food near the door and let it come to you. But remember that a cat needs your help and affection too. Sit still and it will come, seeking that warm, comforting lap it has not entirely forgotten. Be there to open the door for it.
One day your grown up child will walk into the kitchen, give you a big kiss and say, “you’ve been on your feet all day. Let me get those dishes for you.”
Then, you’ll realize your cat is a dog again.
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SUGGESTED READING:
Are you smarter than a 5th grader?
Answers given by Fifth graders to the following questions about “Mothers”:
Q. Why did God make mothers?
1. She’s the only one who knows where the selotape is.
2. Mostly to clean the house.
3. To help us out of there when we were getting born.
Q. How did God make mothers?
1. He used dirt, just like for the rest of us.
2. Magic plus super powers and a lot of stirring.
3. God made my mum just the same like he made me. He just used bigger parts.
Q. Why did God give you your mother and not some other mum?
1. We’re related.
2. God knew she likes me a lot more than other people’s mum like me.
Q. What kind of a little girl was your mum?
1. My mum has always been my mum and none of that other stuff.
2. I don’t know because I wasn’t there, but my guess would be pretty bossy.
3. They say she used to be nice.
Q. What did mum need to know about dad before she married him?
1. His last name.
2. She had to know his background. Like is he a crook? Does he smoke a lot ?
3. Does he make at least 1 million a year? Did he say NO to drugs and YES to chores?
Q. Why did your mum marry your dad?
1. My dad makes the best spaghetti in the world. And my mum eats a lot.
2. She got too old to do anything else with him.
3. My grandma says that mum didn’t have her thinking cap on.
Q. Who’s the boss at your house?
1. Mum doesn’t want to be boss, but she has to because dad’s such an idiot.
2. Mum. You can tell by room inspection. She sees the stuff under the bed.
3. I guess mum is, but only because she has a lot more to do than dad.
Q. What’s the difference between mums and dads?
1. Mums work at work and work at home and dads just go to work at work.
2. Mums know how to talk to teachers without scaring them.
3. Dads are taller and stronger, but mums have all the real power ’cause that’s who you got to ask if you want to sleep over at your friends.
Q. What does your mum do in her spare time?
1. Mothers don’t do spare time.
2. To hear her tell it, she pays bills all day long.
Q. What would it take to make your mum perfect?
1. On the inside she’s already perfect. Outside, I think some kind of plastic surgery.
2. Diet. You know, her hair. I’d diet, maybe blue.
Q. If you could change one thing about your mum, what would it be?
1. She has this weird thing about me keeping my room clean. I’d get rid of that.
2. I’d make my mum smarter. Then she would know it was my sister who did it not me.
3. I would like for her to get rid of those invisible eyes on the back of her head.
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SUGGESTED READING:
Practical child
“I don’t think my mom knows much about children.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Because she always puts me to bed when I am wide awake and gets me up when I am sleepy.”
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SUGGESTED READING:
pumpkintalks 