Suzy Says

Happy Mother’s Day, Ma! Consider the latest bump in the road pay back for all the diapers you changed and nail-biting visits to the emergency room when we were kids. We love you.

I tend to be smug about not having kids, pitying those harassed parents with kids having snotty fits in public places and thinking, “Well, at least I haven’t given up sex, sleep, and all my disposable income for the next 20 years.” But is having cats really all that much different from having a perma-baby?

Instead of diapers, there is the endless chore of cleaning and scooping out the litter boxes. And when you have 4 cats, it’s pretty much a 24 hour poop factory. OK, *I* almost never clean out the litter boxes (that’s one of Rufus’ chores), but still, I know all about it. I even had to clean them out MYSELF for a whole WEEK when Rufus went to visit his parents two years ago. Not to mention locking up at night and everything.

OK, so we have the litter box=diapers thing. Cats are as dependent on us as small babies are when it comes to being fed, so there’s that, too. Though our cats have more than once broken into the food bag when we weren’t looking, whereas you hardly ever catch babies heating up their own bottles or breaking open a jar of Gerber’s. Babies spit up, cats leave hair balls where they’re sure you will step on them in the middle of the night in bare feet. It’s a draw as to which regurgitation is more disgusting.

So cats and babies are both dependent on us for food and cleaning up the food aftermath. But that’s about it. Cats don’t grow up and tell you how stupid and/or uncool you are, they just know it from Day One and it’s in the subtext of your whole relationship with them. Don’t ever think you’re in control of the cats.

It’s very easy to protect your cats from unwanted pregnancy and precocious sexual activity. Just spay ’em and keep ’em inside. End of story. It’s pretty hard to neuter your teenaged daughter with impunity, except possibly in China or India,and even if you give her a gross of condoms and birth control pills, there’s no knowing if she will actually use them, seeing as how she’s immortal and all. But you always know where your cats are when it’s after midnight.

You don’t have to pay for your cats to go to college or have a big white wedding including everyone they have ever spoken to more than once in their entire lives. And cats never grow out of sitting on your lap and purring, no matter how old they get. They are also never too old or dignified to play with you. On the whole, I think we made the right choice.