Weather seems to be the dominant topic of many conversations these days, especially during this seemingly never-ending winter. I think it’s because weather is a unifying force. Love or hate the weather of the day, we all have to deal with it. Sharing weather stories is a great ice breaker (I know, bad pun.) And while different folks have different weather preferences, weather isn’t nearly as polarizing a topic as so many others, although I will admit to being tempted to hide some of my snow loving friends’ status updates from my Facebook newsfeed in recent days….
Weather, especially the recent stretch of severe winter weather in so many parts of the US, also teaches us a few things about life – mostly, that life is unpredictable, no matter what the weather forecasters would have us believe. It teaches us that we’re powerless against Mother Nature’s whims, and as such, weather also becomes a metaphor for letting go of control. Just like we can’t control the weather, we can’t control much of anything else, no matter how hard we try. Being flexible is one of the hallmarks of mental health, and nothing teaches us about being flexible like a winter storm messing up our travel plans.
Of course, the best way to stop trying to control your life, and the weather, is to live in the moment. And what better teachers for doing that than our cats?
When it comes to cats and weather, cats may serve another very useful purpose. According a a recent article in Time, cats can predict the weather. Time unearthed some feline weather wisdom in an old book of weather proverbs:
- When cats sneeze it is a sign of rain.
- When cats are snoring foul weather follows.
- When cats lie on their back, expect a storm.
- When a cat washes her face with her back to the fire expect a thaw in winter.
Apparently too many of our feline friends have been snoring and not washing their faces with their backs to the fire this winter.
Graphic at top of post adapted from a Weather Kitty App screenshot. Ruby, and her mom, would be quite content if the mercury never dropped below 80 degrees.
Well, the snoring thing sure isn’t true or we would not have had such a mild and dry winter in No. California. I did sympathize with all those people whose power goes out in a snow storm when we had a recent brief outage due to who knows what? I was ok with it because I have candles all over the house but the cats got very nervous. Might have been the deadly silence or the flickering candles but it sure was a reminder that we are at the mercy of Mother Nature. Our temps have been in the 60’s but we are finally getting some rain.
Um, Ruby??? Can you send some of that 80 degree stuff over here? We have a LOT of snow that needs melting. ; )
…don’t know if this is a coincidence or not, but Waffles has been sneezing this week. A different sound of sneeze. And we’ve had LOTS of snow, even a little rain.
He’s going in for hiss vaccinations, so we’ll make sure the sneezes aren’t anything to worry about.
; )
Oh no, I hope Waffles is okay. It looks like he might have gotten a paw on the keyboard when you wrote about his vaccine appointment, given the spelling of “hiss”…. 🙂
I have recently begun using Emotional Freedom Technique, or “Tapping”, to help me deal with all the many challenging aspects of life which I can’t control, including weather.
Ingrid, is there any equivalent to Tapping for cats?
I agree with you and Ruby about the 80 degree weather!
Some people say you can tap for pets using a technique called proxy tapping. Here’s an article about it from Dr. Karen Becker: http://healthypets.mercola.com/sites/healthypets/archive/2012/05/16/eft-on-pets.aspx
Since EFT works on the body’s energy system, I see no reason why it wouldn’t work with a proxy. Like other energy modalities, it’s the energetic connection that facilitates healing.
It has been a bit warmer here. I cannot take the 25 below zero weather. But; I also don’t like the 80 and humid either. Been some strange weather this year. I learned to live in the moment a long time ago. Much easier. LOL I agree on the cats snoring & washing their faces.
You know what, Sue, you are so right: living in the moment does make everything a lot easier! What a great way of looking at it.