Raise your hand if you’ve ever had a pet cat and the cat gave you a mouse, bird, lizard, etc as a present. Ok, I can’t see you raising your hand but I trust that you are.
While house-sitting for a friend recently, her utterly adorable and loving cat brought me a small agama—a type of common spiny lizard here. I was in the kitchen at the sink when I saw him walk in with something in his mouth. He passed behind me then set it down on the rug next me. I bent down and scooped it up. It was still very much alive so I didn’t examine it for injuries, since it had already been stressed enough, but just put it outside in a safe place to go hide.
Several questions came to mind that will remain unanswered unless someone develops the ability to read cats’ minds. But here they are anyway. Did the cat catch the lizard and bring it to me to show it off? Was he bragging in a cat way about what a great hunter he is? Was he really offering it to me as a gift? If so, did he catch the lizard and then decide to give it to me or did he decide he wanted to give me something and then catch the lizard? That’s my favorite scenario. He thought of me and decided to give me a gift to show how much he loves me. And men wonder why women tend to like cats so much.
