The Day it Snowed and My Mother was Very Bad

Sometimes, I think my mother must hate me. If I told you what happened today, you probably wouldn’t believe it. Not even if I told you.

My mother has a bird feeder that I like to watch. Lots of birds come to eat. I would like to catch them with my stealth and with my teeth and my claws. But my mother doesn’t let me.

Instead, I am reduced to sitting at the window, twitching my tail and chittering. When everybody knows that cats are supposed to be dignified and self-contained. (Unless there’s catnip around. Catnip is different.)

But my sister Lily doesn’t know that. She just loves my mother. She sits on my mother’s desk and gazes into my mother’s eyes and purrs and purrs while my mother scratches behind her ears. Just currying favor, if you ask me. And a more disgusting display of doggish devotion I’m sure I’ve never seen.

This is what my sister looks like. She was watching birds, too. She was sitting on a people chair at the kitchen table.

My mother thinks Lily is beautiful. But all she ever says about me is that I’m a stripey, swirly-tailed boy cat.

Anyway, today this bird was just sitting in a tree right outside the picture window (I have a good seat right there, on a table, so I can keep an eye on things). And there was this bird, sitting there, just taunting me. This is what the bird looked like.

I went to the door and stretched up and touched the door knob with my paw and looked at my mother and mewed very nicely and something happened. She came over and opened the door!

That’s when I realized that there was snow on the ground. I know all about snow because I lived outside before I came to live with my mother and father and brother and Lily. And more terrible, awful, cold, wet stuff you simply cannot imagine.

Anyway, I think opening the door when there was snow on the ground was a very dirty trick. It would have served my mother right if I went bounding out and caught one of her stupid birds.

Afterward, I sat down and very pointedly turned my back to my mother and ignored her studiously. It’s important that she receive proper discipline so that she can learn how to be a good mother.

But do you know what happened then? She actually had the gall to laugh and say, “Who’s such a very silly, naughty-good boy cat?” Silly!!! Honestly . . .

Sometimes, I think my mother must hate me.

Signed,
Julian Fergus

P.S. This is me: