Lessons from cats:

It's about time I wrote about cats. I've been intimately connected with two in recent years and they've taught me a lot. And, come to think about it, as companions on my spiritual journey, they've been around for most of it.

I'll post in the next week or so a piece I wrote some time ago when winters were winter and there was snow. You know, that white stuff that hung around for days, stop trains running and made children happy to have a new friend in the back garden along with unlimited permission to throw things at one another - and their parents. But back to the more recent past.

Archie was our first cat. There's a lot to say about him and his life with us. He's not with us now and it still hurts to remember him so the full story is for another day. However, he did put you in touch with the almighty.

I'm not on about the saying that the Egyptians once believed cats were gods and some cats haven't forgotten it. Nor am I revisiting Douglas Adam's man at the end of the universe who used to think that he'd discuss problems put to him by possibly imaginary visitors with THE LORD - his cat. No. Archie always saw us as the almighty ones.

You see when he went out in the morning and it was raining we knew we were in for a rough time. In a matter of minutes he'd be back in and pouncing on our bed. Whatever was left sticking out above the duvet got bit or scratched. He saw us as his almighty power - because we fed him I suppose - and he expected us to make it stop raining.

If only life was that simple!

Alfie is another bundle of fur completely. Much more laid back and resigned to getting wet as he sits under a bush. It was a surprise the other day when he brought a pigeon home that he'd managed to kill. It was only later that we realised that the pile of feathers marking the point of execution was right next to the bush under which he sat to watch the world go by. That meal had dropped literally into his lap.

But this year Alfie has taught me an awful lot about hope and expectation.

In the eaves of the house next-door some sparrows or other small birds make a nest. Alfie was aware of this when in the early spring he watched the adults flitting to and fro with the building materials. He took to sitting at the foot of the wall looking up at the nest site. He knew what they were doing and hoped that something tasty was going to drop into his mouth.

As spring turned to early summer the young birds hatched out. Alfie could hear them and watched more intently as mum and dad raced back and forth desperately feeding them. "Surely they could spare one?" Alfie was thinking as he sat at the corner below. But nothing ever came his way.

In the end he got so desperate that he found that he could climb up the corner of the wall and get really close to the nest. You knew when he was doing this because the alarm calls echoed round the garden. However, the nest was still out of reach under the eaves. Alfie figured out that he could stick a paw in and scoop out a feast. The only snag was that he couldn't cling to the wall with only three feet. All the got for his trouble was a ten feet fall back to the point he'd started from.

Summer became late summer and the parents infuriated Alfie by raising a second brood. Never the less he was not to be deterred. Day after day he would spend a while sitting at the bottom of the wall looking up at the out of reach mid morning snack. In fact it became such a habit that long after the nest was deserted he'd go on sitting there. He was determined that nothing was going to escape his grasp. He'd even wait so long that he'd fall asleep. If you don't believe me I've uploaded some photos onto my MySpace site for you to see.

So, what's the point of all this?

Well, as I said, we can learn a lot from cats. We can learn that sometimes things don't go the way we'd like them to. No matter what we believe often there is nothing anyone can do about it - not even those we see as all powerful. Maybe they - and God - have their own agenda.

But like Alfie we can live in hope. No matter how inaccessible something attractive to us appears we can - and should - keep trying to reach it. Often we'll fall, sometimes more than 10 feet. But if we have hope and hang on in there one day what we are desperate to reach will simply drop into our laps.

Like a big fat pigeon in front of the bush we're sheltering under from the ever present rain.