Do you treat your partner better than your cat? Some of you are thinking… it’s a cat; who doesn’t treat their partner better? Um, almost everyone, and I don’t just mean the weird ones who have a quorum of felines and smell like cat urine. Not to be rude, but that’s a bad life choice; cat urine scent has never been sold as a perfume for a reason. Consider this: Your cat can be a jerk. Your partner can also be a jerk. And if your cat and partner are both a jerk at the same time, who do you forgive quicker? Yeah, usually the cat, which means we’re showing more love to the cat than to our partner. But how we treat our cat should be a benchmark for how much better we treat our partner. In general, I’ve always been bad for treating cats better than people. I remember as a kid being in the shower and seeing one of my sister’s long red strands of hair stuck to the wall and being like “Ew gross; that is disgusting… ew, ew, ew. I’m not touching that.” After splashing water on it to get it down the wall and in the drain, I needed a shower after the current shower. Meanwhile my clothes were covered in cat hair and I was like whatever. Even worse, is later that day my cat coughed up a hairball, and I was like: (calm) “Gross,” but it still wasn’t like seeing my sister’s strand of hair, which means I showed more love to my cat than to my sister. That’s not good… hopefully you’re aware of that. For those of you wondering, the hairball was cleaned up… by someone else. I pretended I didn’t see it, and quickly walked away; you know, like a normal person… a normal person who’s a jerk; I’ll own that.
As a married man, I need to be trying to treat my partner better than the cat. For instance, I have a friend who, when her cat is in snit, she just says “looks like someone’s being a moody woody kitty cat” and carries on with her day. Guys, when your partner’s in a bad mood, please don’t say, “Looks like someone’s being a moody woody kitty cat…” I don’t want to end up in the police report… again, but when your partner is in a bad mood, let them. Don’t take it personally, don’t try to fix them and above all, don’t get angry at your partner for being angry… ladies. Sorry, that just slipped out. I remember years ago being angry and the girl I was dating at the time got angry at me for being angry; that was a good moment. I got punished for being angry, and then later I was told I didn’t share my emotions enough… how does that make sense? Looking back I wish I had said, “Please treat me like a cat. Give me space and don’t take it personally.”
Cat owners are impressive because they put up with all kinds of rejection from their cat like when they slink away from your touch, and what’s the reward? You get to clean the litter box every day… woo fun. All this is for the hope the cat will show you affection. Not many married people have this kind of devotion and hope. If you’re constantly cleaning up after your partner, you’re not normally thinking “I hope we can cuddle later; that will make this all worth it.” No, you’re often thinking, “Someone’s not getting any loving tonight.” Please know I’m not saying we should be a pushover, but we do need to consider what it means to be more patient and understanding to our partner than to our cat.
Finally, my wife loves to say compliments and loving things to our cat to show she cares. The most common thing she says is, “I love your big fat fuzzy bum.” Again, don’t directly quote me. I don’t know too many women who like being told they have a big, fat or fuzzy bum. And guys? Ehn, they probably won’t mind, but they might reciprocate with something similarly dumb: (dumb guy trying to be funny) “And I love your veiny, cottage cheese, thunder thighs.”
The bottom line is… get it? I was talking about a fuzzy bum then said bottom line? Ehn? Strange question: If a child has a streak in his underpants, is that a bottom line? Sorry, weird thought moment. I’m a guy, so I can have these times. The bottom line is we need to treat our partner better than a cat. We need to be ready to show better patience and understanding, and be as complimentary and playful with our partner.
This week may you consider whether you treat your cat better than your partner and/or family.
Rev Chad David, ChadDavid.ca, learning to love dumb people