But it actually makes more sense to ask ourselves, “Why wouldn’t they do this?”
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Consider how the cat would be spending their time if they had to scope out their prey, come up with a strategy to ambush it, execute that strategy, and wind up with a hot lunch. It would take considerable time and concentration.
But this would not be a distressing series of events for the cat, would it? This would be a highly satisfactory and involving experience that would be talked up in the Cat Bar. If cats had bars.
Cats have instincts, reflexes, emotions, and mental processes designed to pursue and eat their prey. That is how they “make their living” in the wild. None of this goes away once they live with us.
And dinner becomes something that appears in their bowl.
There’s a lot of energy and drive left over, isn’t there?
Maybe we think our cat is food obsessed because they continually ask for food, patrol the kitchen, or are so quick to follow us in there.
It might sometimes seem that I’m a bit nutty when I suggest we give our cats candlelight suppers or we make dinner into a floor show.
But that is only because I’ve found that cats are happiest when we make some effort to give meals even a fraction of the excitement and drama that would normally accompany every meal, every day.
We play with our cats and admire how they leap and pounce. We throw out mice and sponge balls for them to chase. We laugh at the joy they get from a ball of paper or length of yarn.
All this activity has one purpose, yet rarely leads to a meal. I’m not suggesting it always should. Yet the devotion and drive cats put into their play shows how important it is to them.
It simply makes sense that the point of their play is to get dinner. This makes dinner the culmination, the peak experience, the Third Act, the point.
This is why the cat attempts, as best they can, to put a little pursuit into their prey after it appears in the bowl.
It’s as though they are saying, Not that I don’t appreciate this, but is that all there is?
We might not break them of these habits if we start making a fuss over mealtimes. But we can give them more of the satisfaction they are looking for.
So let’s talk up dinnertime and get the cat excited. Let them smell the food before it gets dished out, or choose a flavor, or get to follow the dish into another room.
There should be thrills going on at mealtime.
Deep down, that’s what they are used to.
And what they are looking for.
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There’s more ways to understand our cat with The Way of Cats than the article you are reading now. See all of my posts on WHY CATS DO THAT.
