Sometimes Nature Knows Best

I don’t remember this myself, but Mom used to tell me about it. It happened when my younger brother was a toddler, about thirty years ago.

For some reason, he was crying and Mom tried to comfort him by offering a biscuit but he refused to take it. Meanwhile, my older brother and I tried to sing lullabies to help. It didn’t work.

I can only imagine all the noise that must have caused, and it alarmed — and possibly annoyed — our fifth family member, our cat. She was like an extra mom to my younger brother and me. For example, she would carefully lie down above my head when Mom went out with me in a baby stroller, as if to keep me warm and safe.

Without Mom noticing it, the cat came into the room, jumped up in the crib, and carefully took a small bite of the biscuit. For some reason, that made my brother stop crying, as he then snatched it away, almost like “That’s mine!” In that moment, the cat calmly left the room, her mission completed.