Cat(s)

1 October 2023

This is Day 1 of my new daily drawing and writing practice, which you will get in your inbox. As mentioned, no promises about what I will draw or write about – I actually feel it might be a bit like going back to the ‘old days’ of regular blogging.

Cats are at the forefront of my brain at the moment. We have a new(ish) kitten(ish). And an old lady cat. We are not doing brilliantly at helping them to get used to each other and like (or tolerate) each other. We are getting good at scheduling and feline routine prediction so that we can (mostly) avoid snarly meetings (aka old lady cat chasing new young cat out of ‘her’ space).

We think old lady’s eyesight may not be brilliant so that what she is chasing is a fast black blur that could, for all she knows, be anything. But she does know that another cat kinda lives here. She doesn’t try to eat from young cat’s bowls now. She doesn’t usually go into young cat’s room (also eldest teen’s room – we don’t live in a mansion where each cat gets a whole room of her own!). But she does set up camp just the other side of the cat flap when she knows (or thinks – sometimes young cat has succeeded to sneak back in without her realising, with or without our help) young cat is outside, so she can chase her away.

We spend a lot of time carrying old lady cat around the house to take her out of young cat’s way. And trying very hard to ignore her scratching at the door to get out. We are also spending some time (but not enough – we are not consistent or patient, and we have also been very busy with work lately) sitting in between them, feeding them treats and stroking them, and carrying old lady cat to look at young cat eating.

We will get to a point where they coexist I am sure, though less sure that they will ever become besties. But getting to that point is taking longer than we thought it would and is becoming the main topic of conversation in the house and whenever we see anyone else.

I am also planning a series of drawings of women with cats. Because… well… I really like pictures of women with cats and I have been sketching lots of women with cats, so I think maybe that could be ‘a thing’ that I draw.

In fact, it’s already something I draw in one way or another, but I would like to make an actual proper series…

I am really not sure why I have decided to protect the identity of two cats by calling them ‘old lady cat’ and ‘young cat’ when they do have actual names. But I guess I’ll go with it.

Also, I have definitely failed today in constraining this task to half an hour! But it is a Sunday, so perhaps I will manage that better on weekdays.

I have also saved the cat and the word cat(s) as an SVG, though Substack doesn’t want me to upload SVGs (boo). I am really into SVGs lately and love that I can make transparent, rescalable vectors. I have an idea for making some SVG illustration packs. [If anyone has a need for a funky multicoloured cat or a scrawly handwritten version of the word cat(s), though not yet for Substack use, let me know!]

See you tomorrow!