A Black Heart's Romance

My 6 month old kitten, Cowgirl, is not your typical cat. She is bounce-off-the-wall-zany, has a never-ending source of energy, and she is most definitely - above and beyond all else - a dog trapped in a cat's body. Ever since we first brought her home at 3 months old, she has always seemed to me to be more dog-like in her characteristics.

Cowgirl lacks the dignity, grace, and elegance that I'm prone to seeing in cat behavior. She runs into walls turning a corner too fast, rolls off the bed or the couch in a playful fit, misjudges her jumps, and is constantly underfoot - often leading to accidental kicks and missteps by Alec and I. Her klutziness and her seeming unawareness give her a personality all her own - one that Alec and I find charming.

She makes up for her lack of cat-like attributes by constantly amusing and surprising us with her quirkiness. Whereas your stereotypical cat is aloof of all things human and quite fickle, Cowgirl desires the companionship of either Alec and I over playing with our other cat, Zissou, and over having her own quiet alone time. She is as loyal as can be. Whether we scold her for being a bad kitty, or whether we accidentally kick her in the dark hallway in the middle of the night on the way to the bathroom, she never runs away and never expresses irritation or anger with us. Instead, she follows us around, meowing happily at our feet until she gets a scratch on the head. She lives to be loved by us.

Cowgirl also never fails to be waiting at the door with loving meows when we come home from a day out. I've often watched her when I've been home alone and both of us are awaiting Alec's arrival from work. Before I even hear the gate to our apartment complex open, she is up and pacing in front of the door. I don't know how she always knows, but within a few more seconds, the gate opens and closes and the footsteps stop in front of our door, accompanied by jingling keys.

Cowgirl turns practically anything into a toy and finds joy in hours of mindless play. Though she does have a favorite cat toy (a small, round, furry, leopard pouch with pom-pom legs) she also enjoys chasing and batting around gum wrappers, bottle tops, pieces of loose carpet that she's torn off her scratching post, straws, shoelaces, whatever necklace I happen to be wearing, my hair, and probably her most favorite of non-kitty toys, her own tail. Cowgirl has spent many an hour running in circles, grasping and nipping at her tail, somersaulting around until she catches it in her little paws. On more than one occasion we have pulled Cowgirl out of a nap just by taunting her with her own tail, sending her into fits of self-attack.

Cowgirl also likes human food. All of it. Whereas Zissou turns up his nose at practically all of our food (except for yogurt), Cowgirl literally has her face buried in our plates to try any and everything. She also has a thing for yogurt, but we've also discovered she has a passion for plain turkey, very spicy chicken, Panda Express, and chili. Her favorite food, as far as we can tell, is a bagel with cream cheese. Her morning ritual is to perch on the counter and hover over Alec's breakfast plate, licking the cream cheese right off his bagel, and even tearing off some of the bagel itself. The only thing she hasn't taken to is lentil soup. Go figure. Cowgirl also prides herself on beating me to the fridge every time I step foot in the kitchen, and as soon as the door opens, she eagerly jumps in to explore the contents of each shelf.

Cowgirl's most dog-like qualities, however, are her keen ability in, and her deep love of the games of fetch and catch. When she is in play mode, Cowgirl will often pick up her favorite kitty toy (the leopard thing I mentioned earlier) and drop it in front of one of us, often right in our lap in the middle of whatever we're currently doing. The toy is then thrown to a distant corner of a room and Cowgirl charges after it, retrieves and delivers it directly back to Alec or me. This is her favorite thing to do. I was surprised the first time she brought the toy back, thinking it must be a fluke. Who had ever heard of a cat that played fetch? But it was no fluke. The game often continues for at least 10 minutes, or until Cowgirl exhausts herself with running all over the apartment and finally flops in a heap on the floor. She is equally adept at catch. One lazy evening Alec and I were playing fetch with her in our room. Alec began tossing the toy just barely beyond her reach and to our surprise she began diving after it. We started tossing it just a little bit higher and Cowgirl would snatch it out of the air, catching it between her front paws. We kept throwing the toy higher and higher and every time Cowgirl performed amazing leaps and flips but always came away with the toy tucked in her paws, or in her mouth. This is a game that she has become quite fond of. She often makes amazing jumps off the edge of the bed to catch a toy that is about to land just out of reach. She rarely misses unless we wear her out and she gives up.

I've always been highly entertained by Cowgirl's antics, but today came a new surprise. I was writing an email when I noticed Cowgirl on her back tearing at something under the front door. After a few minutes of desperate effort, she finally came away with something in her mouth. Thinking she was about to eat a bug, I rushed over to see what it was she had. It was a stick. I returned to my email, only to be interrupted by Cowgirl dropping the stick in my lap, stepping away, sitting on the ground, and looking up at me expectantly. She was waiting for me to throw the stick. Not only does my cat play fetch, but now she was playing fetch with a stick that she went out of her way to uncover.

I wish I had all her crazy capers caught on tape, but for now I just sit back and enjoy watching all the nonsense - how she's learned to scale the dresser drawers by pulling herself up by her front paws from drawer to drawer until she reaches the top, when she could very easily just jump up from the bed (which she also does, but climbing is just so much more exciting), how she's learned to actually open the dresser drawers and climbs inside to explore the area behind the drawers, how she enjoys eating pieces off of our Christmas tree, how sometimes she just stares for minutes upon minutes at her litter box, how she loves to lay across my shoulders like a giant live scarf, how she spoons Alec's arm while he works and eventually falls asleep splayed across his body, how she immediately runs into my closet whenever she hears the door slide open, how she squeezes herself behind our desktop computer when we are using it just to be close to us, and the hundreds of other things she does daily. Anyone who says that cats have no personality have obviously never met Cowgirl.