Cat Dream

Another long day comes to an end as I crawl into bed alone.  I lay outstretched and comfortable beneath a thick wool blanket, staring at the flickering, warm glow of the television in an otherwise dark bedroom. I contemplate the surroundings of this place where dreams live during "little slices of death," as Edgar Allan Poe once called sleep.
 
As I ponder my complacency, I think that I couldn’t possibly feel more comfortable and relaxed.  Just then, the family cat enters the room, leaps up next to me, slowly saunters towards my face like a queen entering her court, and says "meep meep" softly to declare her mien.  Despite her regal bearing, she seems to seek approval of her presence.  I provide it with a soft stroke of my hand between her ears.  Reassured, she turns repeatedly in little, gentle circles beside me.  With her outstretched paws, she softens the blanket, creating the perfect spot.  She lays beside me, pressing her warm, furry side there, and then spends the next few minutes cleaning her legs, belly, and side with long, slow licks of her tongue.  When finished, she stretches out her arms and legs, becoming thoroughly relaxed, sedate, and peaceful.  Her face is only inches from mine as she looks at me warmly, her head resting on my arm, close to my shoulder.  Closing her eyes, she wiggles her whiskers, says "meep meep" again, and then drifts silently off to sleep.

Before long, her face, whiskers, and legs begin to twitch --- slowly at first, but then more erratically, as she seems to drift deeper and deeper into her languid slumber.  Observing this behavior, it makes me wonder if cats dream, and the twitching is a feline version of rapid eye movement manifested with limbs and facial expressions instead of the jerky eyeball movements that humans show.  And if cats can dream, what do they dream about?  Do they simply dream about the things cats do, or could they have weird cat dreams like people have weird people dreams?

Is she dreaming perhaps, of chasing little rolled up balls of paper thrown across the room, or might she be dreaming of stalking and attacking a bird.  I wonder.  Or worse, could she be suffering in some terrible cat nightmare, being chased by a giant paper ball, or pecked at by an enormous bird.

Lying next to me, all of her paws jerk feverishly, as her ears and whiskers twitch wildly, and her mouth opens and closes rapidly.  She emanates squeaky, fearful sounding, "raaarrriiiirrrrrr" sounds as if she is trying to tell somebody something or she is crying for help.

I watch her, wondering what drama is playing out in her dream world, wishing I was omniscient, allowing me to look inside her mind to see what she is doing.  Suddenly, she lifts her head quickly and looks around swiftly as if she wants to reassure herself that what was just happening in her mind wasn’t real and was after all, just a dream.

Glancing in my direction, she gives me an expression of relief with her eyes when she realizes where she is and that whatever she was just experiencing wasn’t real.  Reassured, she regains her composure, and lies back down as a little "meep meep" escapes her mouth once more.

My wife enters the bedroom now, arriving from the adjoining bathroom, wearing her flowing, silk gown, looking like a queen, having performed the nightly ritual of hair brushing, teeth brushing, and face washing.  She slides silently beneath the blanket, pulls it up to her chin, and cozies up next to my body’s other side with her leg pressed warmly next to mine.  Stretching her arms over her head, her toes peek out beyond the bottom edge of the blanket.  She utters "mmmm" as I see her toes duck quickly back beneath the blanket, escaping the slight chill that fills the room.  Her arms reach for the little bedtime piece of chocolate she had previously placed on the nightstand on her side of the bed, and the latest girly novel she has been reading.

We all three lie together soft, warm, and cozy as if we were a kindle of feral kittens living together in a cave.

The light from the television flashes upon the walls of the bedroom like moonlight shining in on the walls of our wild home.  The little nightlight my wife uses to read with creates a little zone of angelic illumination around her head like the radiance that Renaissance artists painted around the heads of saints to emphasize their subjects' affinity with God.  Placing her head on my shoulder, her face only inches from mine, she smiles at me as I turn my head toward her.  I feel happy and peaceful as though I died and have gone to heaven.

In the cavernous room, the only sounds to break the silence are the intermittent buzz of the television, a softly muttered "mmmm" from my wife as she nibbles her chocolate while reading, and an occasional "meep meep" from the cat when she repositions herself, searching for a more comfortable spot.

Eventually, I hear gentle puffing sounds of air escaping from my wife's mouth like an overworked compressor on its last leg.  I slowly turn my head to see her eyes closed, an empty chocolate wrapper and her novel lying upon her chest.  Quietly and stealthily, I reach over, turn off her little light, take her novel and the empty wrapper, and place them on my nightstand.

Twitching of the whiskers, ears, and paws signal to me that the cat has returned to her dream state.  I can see that my wife has begun to dream also. Her eyes dart back and forth beneath her eyelids as her hand flicks lightly. I wonder what she is dreaming about.  Perhaps she is dreaming about nibbling chocolate.

Suddenly, my head jerks up from my pillow as I look around the room.  I see the family cat stretched out on one side of me, and my wife snuggled up on my other side.  I quickly realize that I too had drifted off at some point, as I open my eyes, not even realizing that they had ever been closed, and recall a dream I just had about crawling into bed alone.