DECEMBER 2006 

   I have two cats: Neyland and Bocci. They are both very playful cats who immensely enjoy the holiday season, especially Christmas. For instance, they get as much enjoyment from putting up the family Christmas Tree as I do. Of course, they do very little in terms of actually putting up the tree, but they love playing in the boxes, eating the wrapping paper of the presents nestled at the foot of tree and even attempting to reach the numerous Star Wars ornaments that don this symbol of the season.

Every year at Thanksgiving, the Christmas Tree goes up. In year's past, I've delivered a few stern warnings as the tree endured the cat's playful attacks. Actually, I tried about everything to prevent their playing at our tree's expense. Squirting water at them didn't work. Making a loud noise as they would begin one of their attack patterns didn't work. Eventually, I learned to patiently allow the cats to do their exploring. It seemed that half of their fun was found in assaulting the tree behind my back. After all, I could live with a few broken ornaments because by early December, with their curiosities satisfied, they were content to merely sit underneath the tree and enjoy its symbolic glow. However, this year was different. This year I was having family visiting for the Thanksgiving holiday weekend and wanted the tree in tip-top shape for their visit. The family had never seen my Star Wars Christmas Tree and I wanted it to look great and spread plenty of holiday cheer in the process.

The night of Thanksgiving, with the tree brightly lit, I talked to cats about leaving it alone. We made a deal: They were to leave the tree alone until our visitors left and they could have their way with it afterward. Yeah, I realize this sounds crazy, but similar talks had actually worked in the past. For instance, a few years ago before one of our talks, Neyland would very aggressively scratch her ear, which had caused a blood clot. After our talk, she began scratching her ears very gently and has avoided further issues. With this in mind, I was hopeful that a similar strategy would yield similar results. Actually on Thanksgiving Night, it did. I issued a few stern warnings at Bo, who was in the midst of lashing out toward a Darth Vader ornament, and it seemed to do the trick quite nicely. We seemed to have a deal.

Unfortunately, after very positive initial results, my hope came crashing down--along with the Christmas Tree--on Friday afternoon, just hours before the arrival of my family. I had been cleaning the house most of the morning and was in the shower when Bo took advantage of the solitude to apparently jump into the tree, bringing it down and breaking the tree stand in the process. Of course, I was furious. "But we had a deal," I yelled to an oblivious Bo. Of course, Bo knew she had done something wrong. Bo knew she was not supposed to attack the tree. Bo knew she was in trouble, but it was Bo's eyes that really told the story. Bo's eyes were echoing an eighties Nike ad by saying: Bo knows Christmas Trees!

At any rate, the tree was unfixable and I had very little time to remedy the problem. My options were to either throw out the tree and decorate Bocci or to quickly buy another tree and re-decorate. Despite my anger at Bo, I chose the latter. You see, Bo's eyes had a lot more to say. Bo's eyes were very clearly saying: "It's Christmas time...you know...compassion...good will toward all. Unconditional love. Your fellow man doesn't often understand that, but you can--and...you can start with me!"

Good points Bo.

What seemed like a nightmarish prelude to a wonderful holiday weekend, was an event that taught me two very important lessons: 1) when making a deal with a pet...get it in writing; and 2) the holidays are truly about love and compassion and the symbols of the season are really meaningless if we don't we live them every day of the year.

 © BrandVision Marketing. 2006. Scott Trueblood. All rights reserved.

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