My little sister has a cat.

Growing up, we had a variety of pets in our family.  When I was very young, barely young enough to remember at all, we had two cats, both then elderly.  My parents never got another cat, because it turns out both my elder sister and my father are allergic to them.  The first real pet I remember us having was my elder sister’s iguana, Spice.  Then my parents announced to me that what I really wanted wasn’t a boa constrictor (to this day, part of me still wants one, whatever they say), but a dog.

I had never had a dog.  I knew nothing about dogs.  None of my friends had dogs.  I’d seen them run around the neighborhood, but that was it.

In any case, they got me Lucia from the pound: part Husky, part Golden Retriever, part Rottweiler.  Then my elder sister’s iguana was unhappy, so my parents gave Spice away and got her a German Shepherd/Australian Cattle-Dog: Holly.  Then my dog was given away and my father told me that what I really wanted was a purebred German Shepherd.

I disagreed strongly, but my parents got me the dog anyway: Jenny. I had her until the first year I went away to college, when she was six years old.  Cancer got her.

Throughout these last few years, my younger sister had a succession of five hamsters and then a guinea pig.  They lived in her room, so I was only vaguely aware of them.

Holly, by the way, lived to be fourteen.  She was an extremely intelligent dog and knew it.

Now, as an adult, I don’t have any pets at all.  I hope to again someday.  Maybe I’ll even get a boa constrictor (although I rather doubt it).

But the fact remains: my little sister has a cat.  He’s a Balinese mix and is currently curled up about five feet away from me.  My little sister and I are both staying at our parents’ house for a few days for Christmas, so I have every opportunity to observe this cat up close (the first cat with whom I’ve had this chance since I was about four).  In this time, I have come to the following conclusion:

He acts a lot like a dog.

Oh, don’t get me wrong, he does give me long superior cat stares . . . but so did Holly.

He curls up the way our dogs did, follows us around the same way, begs to be played with, long-sufferingly puts up with being picked up, loves to have his belly rubbed, sits and guards the door, and plays (gentle) tug-of-war. . . .  

This is not what I expected in a cat!  He hardly ever walks through walls, never sits normally on my lap (he likes to be held belly-up, for some reason), only purrs when he’s getting annoyed, and so on.

I think I’ll go pet him some more.

Holly