mew

I came home from work last to hear plaintive mews coming from the tree outside my house. Stooping down, I discovered the cutest ginger kitten cowering beneath the fronds of bird's nest fern and other random green foliage. My sister and I tried to coax it out with some liver pate, but it refused to leave the safety of the tree, apparently petrified by the lights and noise from the main road and our advances only drove it further up the tree. I would stare at it and mew, and it would look like it was about to jump into our waiting arms, but ultimately lose its nerve and go back to mewing. After an hour of this to-and-fro, we gave up and went back in.

Standing there observing the kitten , I realised it reflected a lot of human sentiment. Often we get hurt and climb up a metaphorical tree for 'shelter'. Or we face a difficult situation, and despite the care and solutions offered by those who love us, we choose to sit there wailing and refusing to make the leap of faith, quite unable to see beyond the immediate fall or trust in anything anymore. Staying up in a tree may be a way of avoiding the ground, but it's not necessarily a great way to live.


[Kitteh looked like dis]

The kitten's gone today though. Hopefully its mummy rescued it...