Гвен Купер: Stop Trying To Make Fetch Happen

Once Clayton discovered fetch, it seemed as if the plastic rattling mouse, his new favorite toy, was fated to suffer the same abuse. It was only a couple of days later when I was forced to fish it out of the litter box—pulling it gingerly by its colorful tail feathers—before disposing of it in the trash as Clayton bounced around me in desperate circles, pleading for me to toss it across the room for him. I replaced it the next day (they only cost ninety-nine cents apiece at our local pet-supply store). But, still, once Clayton had seen me pick the toy out of his litter box—with a heartfelt “Ugh!” of disgust—and then throw it away rather than throwing it for him to fetch , it was like a lightbulb went on over his head. After that, I noticed how careful Clayton was to maintain his new little feathered mouse in immaculate condition. Not only did he refrain from burying or drowning it, I’ve actually seen him groom that mouse with his tongue until it’s spotless before carrying it over to lay at my feet. You can’t refuse to throw this one for me! he seems to be saying. This one’s clean as a whistle!

In sales, they call this overcoming a client’s objections. In Clayton, I’ll call it nothing short of genius.

As I mentioned, Fanny likes to leave little “gifts” for Laurence and me—one of her toys, if we’re lucky, or a palmetto bug or some other large bug that’s gotten into the house, if we’re not. She tends to leave them on our pillows, or sometimes on the bath mat directly in front of the shower, where we’re sure to see them as soon as we get out. That we notice her presents is very important to Fanny—she’ll cry anxiously until we find them and then pat her on the head, saying, “Thank you, Fanny!” (which is difficult to do with much sincerity when the gift in question is a giant headless cockroach).

Clayton, in contrast, has never been one for gift giving. Lately, though, I find that wherever I go in the house, Clayton’s rattling toy mouse has already beaten me there. It’s on my pillow at bedtime and on the rug in front of the sink when I go to brush my teeth. It’s atop the closed lid of the laptop computer on my desk when I sit down to work, on the kitchen counter when I go downstairs to make my lunch, and has beaten me to my favorite sofa cushion when I’ve finished work for the day and am ready to relax with Laurence.

The genius of this is that Clayton opts to place his mouse strategically where I’ll have no choice but to pick it up in order to get it out of my way. Once I’ve picked it up, I have to do something with it. Lobbing it across the room doesn’t require much more effort than just dropping it to the floor. So why wouldn’t I throw it? It would seem almost churlish not to—as Clayton’s wide, woebegone eyes are at pains to inform me: Are you really not going to throw it for me? Don’t you love me anymore?

I thought for a while that throwing the mouse up or down the stairs might solve some of my problems—that maybe Clayton would exhaust himself with all that up-and-down running, or that he might even decide to just play with it on his own once I was no longer in his sight line. That was a grave tactical error on my part. Clayton now loves racing up and down the stairs after the mouse more than anything else. When he walks, he slow-hops along as if he had a limp. When he trots, it’s with that hippity-hoppity/drunken-sailor gait that I love so much. But when Clayton tears up or down the stairs, he doesn’t just run—he flies. You’d never know, as he flashes past in a black blur, that he’s any different from a “normal” cat.

Now Clayton wants me to throw the mouse up or down the stairs for him all the time. If I’m in bed, it’s not enough to simply hurl the mouse toward a far corner of the bedroom. I have to sit up in bed, lean forward, and curve my body around so that I can angle the toy through the bedroom door and down the stairs. Clayton, who once couldn’t figure out how to pass through a slightly open door, mastered that skill with ease once he was sufficiently motivated. I’ll hear his paw-steps coming up the stairs and know that within seconds the wedge of light from the hallway will grow as Clayton swings the bedroom door open wide—and then I’ll see Clayton himself, standing next to my side of the bed, the beloved toy mouse clutched between his teeth as its colorful feathers glow in the half-light against the blackness of his fur.

Whether I’m awake or asleep makes no difference. If I’m there lying down, Clayton hauls himself onto the bed, walk-hops right onto my chest, and drops the mouse under my chin. I’ll fight to keep my eyes closed, thinking that if I can feign sleep convincingly enough, he might buy my act and relent.

It never works. Eventually, Clayton will bring his nose directly level with mine and proclaim, “ MEEEEEEE! ”

Roughly translated, this means, Oh, please. Even I can tell you’re faking.

* * *

All cats have their habits and routines, their little rituals that they perform so repetitively, and in so precisely identical a manner each time, that it seems to border on the compulsive. Some of these rituals become permanent; some are temporary but intense. And while there are some habits it’s nearly impossible to break a cat of, the truth is that I probably could have nipped Clayton’s fetch obsession in the bud if I’d really wanted to. If I’d said no often enough, he would have gotten the point eventually and left me alone. Even now, when it’s become such an integral part of his daily routine, if I could muster the willpower to be firm for a few days, I could probably cure him of his addiction—or at least tamp it down enough that I’d have more of a say as to the specific times and locations in which our game would take place.

And yet, despite his persistence and the hassle and the interruption of my sleep schedule and the frequent disruptions to my work, I’ll admit that I find myself reluctant to do anything to stop him.

Maybe it’s because I’m no longer the same person I was twenty years ago, when I adopted my first three cats—those early years of cat-ladyhood when I proudly distinguished between myself, an indulgent but still in-control caretaker, and those who referred to themselves as their cats’ slaves. These days, I’m more apt to appreciate the fleeting nature of a cat’s obsessions—of a cat’s life. Clayton is still young, but time moves much faster than it used to. Just yesterday, Clayton was a kitten. Today he’s five. Tomorrow he’ll be a little old man struggling to lug himself around on his three legs. His days of flying up and down the stairs like greased lightning in pursuit of a toy mouse will be a distant, cherished memory. Much sooner than I’m ready for it, I know, a time will come when I’ll think, What wouldn’t I give to play fetch with Clayton just once more!

No matter how irritated I may get at being interrupted while I’m working or sleeping (or paying my bills, or making a sandwich, or canoodling with my husband), how can I not smile when I see how a humble game of fetch makes Clayton so happy? So happy! His thick club of a tail points straight up and vibrates with his joy. When he does that theatrical, high-speed, baseball-player slide of his, I always, always laugh.

Every single time.

The joy of spoiling our cats is that, in giving them simple pleasures, we get them right back. And they remind us that, no matter how complicated our lives, or how complex our relationships, or how sophisticated our desires and goals may become with the passage of years, those simple pleasures are still the ones most worth having. Even as they become harder to find and hold onto.

I’ll confess, though, that I can’t help missing the old days sometimes. The days when, sure, maybe some people thought Clayton was just a loveable dolt—but at least I got eight hours of uninterrupted, fetch-free sleep every night.