Charley Teaches Me

Prince Charming Charley Cat. That’s how I like to refer to him.

Sometimes I think it’s too much responsibility, a pet.

Sometimes I feel overburdened by his incessant demand for food the instant I walk in the house even if I’ve only been gone a couple of hours…or if it’s 5AM and he hasn’t had a morsel for 8 hours and I’ve had insomnia and only about three hours of sleep (which, BTW, means I’ve probably not had deep REM sleep).

It doesn’t seem to matter if it’s actually mealtime or not, he’s just there reminding me he’s there.

And that’s sort of the thing, right? He’s just reminding me he’s there.

And, even if he actually IS hungry, he’ll just take a few bites and then…remind me he’s there. He loves to make sure I eat dinner when he’s eating dinner. Like, he’ll eat a bit, come over and “case” me: walk around, utter a word or two, go back for another bite, come back to me, “kitty paw” my lap if I’m seated or wind about my legs if I’m standing; he’ll look up at me with those “doleful” eyes of his, blink once and continue to make eye contact. He’s present. He wants me to be present, too.

You see, when I actually pause, pet him, make eye contact, pick him up, scratch HIS back, whatever it is that connects us, then he is fine to go back to eating.

And, if we spend the day together, no matter which room I’m in, he’ll find his way to me, paw me, and then lie down for a luscious catnap. He’s present. Am I?

So. Being present is a gift. He gives his presence to me wholeheartedly, unreservedly. He lets me know he’s gifting me with his presence.

And me? How do I stay present when he’s not there to remind me? How do I get present even when I don’t want to? What’s preventing me from gifting myself with the present moment?

These are the things I ponder.

I don’t have the answer. Or, at least I have an answer that might work some days and mightn’t work quite so well (or at all) on other days.

Brene Brown invites us to concentrate on being grateful. If I understand her correctly, if we can acknowledge our gratitude, we can be present and know that all is well in the present moment.

The thing is, sometimes the present moment is so incredibly painful that I just cannot see the gift in it. At those times, I sit with the pain. I try not to sit alone with the pain and I try not to “nurse” the pain-activator. So, if sitting on a stone bench is painful, I can go to my bed and remember how painful that bench was but I don’t want to sit on the stone bench and cry about how painful it is.

And, there are times in our lives when we just cannot leave the bench…

We are in mourning; a child is ill; a parent is dying; a friend is hurt…we just cannot walk away from the stone bench. It is in those moments that I reach out for soul friends to sit with me. They may not find the bench uncomfortable because their point of view is completely different. The thing is, they don’t point out how different things are for them. They just hold me while I sit in the pain.

This is just one of the many things that Prince Charming Charley Cat teaches me about being present: being a gift to oneself and to others.