Two Kinds of People
There are two kinds of people in the world: those who love cats and those who love dogs. And then there are snake people. I love dogs. I can’t remember a time growing up when my family didn’t have at least one dog, and usually two. For a few years there were four dogs, but that only lasted about three years. And they weren’t purse dogs either. I grew up in coyote country, so if you wanted a dog, it had to be big enough to stay away from coyotes or beat them in a fight. Thus, dobermans and a sheep dog.
But my first pet was a cat. She was a good cat when she decided to show up. Usually she was outside, eating mice or gophers or birds, and leaving the best parts for us on our welcome mat. But when my parents decided to move, we gathered up our dogs, but the cat was not to be found.
Enter cats in the country.
Buying a cat in the country is like cooking steak for the coyotes. You like the cat, you might even grow close to the cat, but it’s only a matter of time before the cat gets eaten and you have to replace it. One time we bought a pair of orange cats. One lasted longer than the other, but soon, they both were meals for coyotes. And then there was Chloe. Chloe was a BAD cat. She loved my brother but crapped in my room. She sprayed (that’s cat talk for pee) into our central air conditioner, costing my parents thousands of dollars and stinking up the ENTIRE house.
Chloe’s last morning at my house is as follows: my dad was getting up for work. Chloe walks over to my dad’s pillow and when she sees him looking at her, she craps on his pillow! My dad grabs her and… removes her from the bed. That, of course woke up my mom, who loved Chloe. My dad, on his way out the door, looked at my mom and said, “When I come back, that cat is not going to be here.” And so Chloe got donated to a neighbor who lived further out in the wilderness than we did. Last I heard, Chloe was eaten by a cougar.
And then I got married!
My wife is terrified of dogs. We have one car between us, and I needed it one day. But she had somewhere she had to go for her work and so I drove her. I let her out and with a book in my hand, I prepared to wait in the car until she was back. In about thirty seconds she came back, being chased by a chihuahua! With a bigger dog, she clung to me, hoping that I would placate the dog and send it back to the hell from which it came. So, owning a dog is out!
And then there are cats. She’s allergic to cats. So, owning a cat is out, and that’s fine with me.
One of my wife’s clients had a snake she didn’t want. I love snakes. That’s probably the residue of growing up in a rural town. So now we own a snake. His name (it might be a she) is Creepy Head because he’s a burrowing snake and he keeps just the first inch of his head visible near the watering hole, waiting for food. And that’s creepy!
Creepy Head was free and costs ten dollars a month to feed. He eats live mice, which suits me just fine (short but horrible story). He doesn’t give off cat dander, doesn’t bark or pee down air conditioner ducts, he doesn’t even strike at people. The only sound Creepy Head makes, other than when it’s slowly and brutally strangling mice, is ruffling the walnut shavings while he burrows. Of course, thanks to Genesis 3:15, my wife is more afraid of him–he’s just a living non-poisonous rope–than she is of dogs. But even she likes watching him eat!