Cats Like to Play, and So Do People

Everyone knows that kittens like to play at stalking and pouncing. They’ll play with shoelaces, with toes, and even with their own tails. Children too, like to play, and we know that they are practicing grown-up skills in the process. 

But it isn’t just young cats that like to play—grown cats do too, exercising their cat skills on fabric mice and wand toys when real prey isn’t around. Books on cats stress that this is good for adult cats, that having regular opportunities to practice their cat skills makes for a happier cat. This makes me think about people, and how grown-ups enjoy playing and practicing their human skills.

One of my cats started me on this train of thought because she would meow at me for no apparent reason. She wanted something, but it wasn’t food. It wasn’t “out.” Petting? A lap to sit on? I couldn’t tell, and she can’t speak human. She liked to play on occasion, and once in a while she would even chase her tail, like a kitten. Da Bird used to be both cats’ favorite—a feathery toy that could be whizzed through the air or dragged on the ground—but too often it seemed like they lost interest quickly. So I didn’t get it out much.

As I worked on a sewing project, she started playing with bits of the fabric.This reminded me that some years ago I had tied leftover strips of fabric together to make a rope that could be dragged around. Our cats sometimes enjoyed chasing and catching it. So I got it out of their toy basket (yes, they have a little basket of cat toys) and played with her for a while. Then I hung it over the back of a chair and left it there.

That chair happens to be right near where she tends to sit and meow. So I started flicking the fabric strip in the air the next time she was meowing in her undecided way.

Turns out she has much more capacity for playing than I realized, with the right toy and the right timing. She grabbed the strip out of the air, she chased it around the house, and she had a great time chewing on the knots in it. Weeks later, she’s still enthusiastic about it.

It could be that she will get bored with the strip of cloth, but I did read that cats prefer toys that give them a feeling that they are making progress, not just in catching the toy, but in tearing it apart. The cloth strips are easy to catch with her claws and the fabric does shred a bit with every capture. Actually, they were unravelling so much that I sewed some new strips with bound edges, so I don’t have to worry so much about her swallowing threads. 

When I play with her and see how much she enjoys exercising her “kitty skills” of stalking and pouncing, I think about all the opportunities to play with her that I’ve missed. I also think about people—grown-up people. Are our lives better if we get regular opportunities to exercise our “human skills?” Do we get enough of the right sort of play?

It’s interesting to make a list of  human specialties and consider the games we play. We are tool-makers and –users, also language-users and social beings, and we used to be hunters and gatherers for our living. As kids, we play tag and other chasing games, hide-and-seek (searching), and various kinds of pretend. We build sand castles and mudpies, and we have singing games and tell stories and jokes.

We have virtual versions of all of these as well, but maybe we need some of the non-virtual, physical games, too, to engage our whole selves, body and mind.

Something to think about.

Till next post.