Cat
For all but one of my years I have had to make do with one parent as my father died when I was less than a year old. My grandparents died far beyond the dim memories of early childhood. Over the years I have often wondered how it would be to lose my mom, then having no parents or grandparents. At 1:34 AM today I received that fateful call that brought my wondering to an end. I was now on my own, or so I thought.
I have a small gray semi-tabby, with splotches of orange, that has been a great soft spot in my life for some eighteen months now. This cat has some idiosyncrasies that make her quite distinctive. Most notable is her immense joy at being held up side down, on her back in one hand, head down, and scratched hard. She stretches grandly in feline catharsis, and yet, I don’t recall how I learned of this perverse pleasure. From what I do know of many other cats, holding them upside down in such a manner would put one at high risk for being mauled and soundly rebuked.
As much as my cat likes this kind of attention, one of her other strong quirks is an unfaltering dislike of anyone being near her when she is lying down. Sleeping on the bed has simply not been in the cards for her. Her preference for nocturnal repose this time of year is between two pots of impatiens on the patio, hidden behind a large red gloxinia. Last night I was lying down, on my back, talking with my brother about Mom's life. In the grim darkness, the cat jumped up on the bed, climbed on my chest and promptly purrclaimed ‘I have arrived to provide you comfort and company.’ For the remainder of the night that little furry blessing slept with me. Every time I tossed and turned the cat purred quite loudly.
Sometimes God wears a fur coat.
A Man's Perfect Love
Nearly all men dream of an idyllic relationship free of harsh words, one where a single pleasing look tells all. Solomon, the wisest man in ancient times told us it is better to live in an attic than to live in a palace with a contentious woman. We men wilt under the power of contentious words. They are death to the soul.
Imagine a relationship in which someone is waiting for you at the door everyday without fail when you get home from work. She asks for nothing in return but a modest bit of affection, more if you are so inclined. Suppose that the whole time not a single ill word ever crosses her lips, instead only pleasing murmurings. Fantasize that she has actually fallen down at your feet and as much said “I’m yours.” Sounding more than pretty good isn't it?
I actually come home to such a splendid circumstance every day. Never once have I heard a sarcastic word and never once have I been nagged about taking out the garbage, picking up my socks, or mowing the grass. You must think I am living in a Star Trek Holodeck. To further wet your appetite, I have found someone who doesn't like to shop and has never once asked me for money! What? How is this possible? Isn't it genetically determined that females are born to shop? No, not really. This belief about women is only part of the American folk myth. But what is amazing is that my little lady doesn't mind when I go out and buy some new power tool that I simply gotta have.
And to push the limits of reality she doesn't mind if I bring other women home in the evening!! You must be wondering what my secret is to finding Nirvana this side of heaven? Bet you would pay your life's savings to get in on this wouldn't you? Because you are a dear friend I will tell you my secret.
Get a gray female tabby cat and feed her Frisky's Special Diet. Be certain to keep around a couple of those big rubber bands used to tie broccoli stocks together as they make the ultimate cat toy.
The best lovers wear fur coats.
For all but one of my years I have had to make do with one parent as my father died when I was less than a year old. My grandparents died far beyond the dim memories of early childhood. Over the years I have often wondered how it would be to lose my mom, then having no parents or grandparents. At 1:34 AM today I received that fateful call that brought my wondering to an end. I was now on my own, or so I thought.
I have a small gray semi-tabby, with splotches of orange, that has been a great soft spot in my life for some eighteen months now. This cat has some idiosyncrasies that make her quite distinctive. Most notable is her immense joy at being held up side down, on her back in one hand, head down, and scratched hard. She stretches grandly in feline catharsis, and yet, I don’t recall how I learned of this perverse pleasure. From what I do know of many other cats, holding them upside down in such a manner would put one at high risk for being mauled and soundly rebuked.
As much as my cat likes this kind of attention, one of her other strong quirks is an unfaltering dislike of anyone being near her when she is lying down. Sleeping on the bed has simply not been in the cards for her. Her preference for nocturnal repose this time of year is between two pots of impatiens on the patio, hidden behind a large red gloxinia. Last night I was lying down, on my back, talking with my brother about Mom's life. In the grim darkness, the cat jumped up on the bed, climbed on my chest and promptly purrclaimed ‘I have arrived to provide you comfort and company.’ For the remainder of the night that little furry blessing slept with me. Every time I tossed and turned the cat purred quite loudly.
Sometimes God wears a fur coat.
A Man's Perfect Love
Nearly all men dream of an idyllic relationship free of harsh words, one where a single pleasing look tells all. Solomon, the wisest man in ancient times told us it is better to live in an attic than to live in a palace with a contentious woman. We men wilt under the power of contentious words. They are death to the soul.
Imagine a relationship in which someone is waiting for you at the door everyday without fail when you get home from work. She asks for nothing in return but a modest bit of affection, more if you are so inclined. Suppose that the whole time not a single ill word ever crosses her lips, instead only pleasing murmurings. Fantasize that she has actually fallen down at your feet and as much said “I’m yours.” Sounding more than pretty good isn't it?
I actually come home to such a splendid circumstance every day. Never once have I heard a sarcastic word and never once have I been nagged about taking out the garbage, picking up my socks, or mowing the grass. You must think I am living in a Star Trek Holodeck. To further wet your appetite, I have found someone who doesn't like to shop and has never once asked me for money! What? How is this possible? Isn't it genetically determined that females are born to shop? No, not really. This belief about women is only part of the American folk myth. But what is amazing is that my little lady doesn't mind when I go out and buy some new power tool that I simply gotta have.
And to push the limits of reality she doesn't mind if I bring other women home in the evening!! You must be wondering what my secret is to finding Nirvana this side of heaven? Bet you would pay your life's savings to get in on this wouldn't you? Because you are a dear friend I will tell you my secret.
Get a gray female tabby cat and feed her Frisky's Special Diet. Be certain to keep around a couple of those big rubber bands used to tie broccoli stocks together as they make the ultimate cat toy.
The best lovers wear fur coats.
Productivity Enhancement And Institutional Survival
I work in a large hospital, and like many other hospitals, the one I work in is making many attempts to find ways to improve the quality of care while at the same time spending less money on it. Sounds almost like an oxymoron doesn't it? One of the things we as a hospital are doing to achieve this is to implement a facility-wide quality-improvement initiative using a variety of statistical measurement techniques that have been used for years in industrial settings. We have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to train more than two thousand employees to various levels of proficiency in the use of Statistical Process Control. All of this to insure institutional survival. You probably know that hundreds of hospitals have been closed over the past ten years because of marginal performance.
A long time ago it was discovered that when measurement strategies are put into place in an organization, what is described as the Hawthorne Effect often occurs. Essentially what happens is that people will improve their job performance when they think they are being watched by experts; with their clipboards, taking measurements. In one of my former lifetimes, I worked four years as a management industrial engineer in a large hospital and I often saw this occur, especially if I had on my white coat, radiation badge, and acted like I knew what I was doing.
Personnel costs are nearly half the operating budget of most any hospital, probably any business, for that matter. If we ‘experts’ can find ways to enhance labor productivity then one has a chance of significantly improving financial performance. Yet, one must also realize these ‘experts’ are not free and tend to run up big laundry bills with their white coats and even bigger dry cleaning bills with their dark business suits. They also tend to want big desks and well decorated offices. It would be an ideal set of circumstances if we could find a way to produce the Hawthorne Effect without the high overhead expenses associated with hiring ‘us.’
As often is the case, inspiration came late at night under duress. I was actually doing some homework, at home, for my job as one of those experts. I was slated to begin a training class in the morning to learn a structured approach to interviewing job applicants. As all business gurus know, employee turnover is exceptionally costly and demoralizing. The management experts at the hospital decided to take a stab at reducing this. While being overly responsible about my job, I discovered a way to induce the Hawthorne Effect without experts!
I was lying on the floor, on my stomach, reading through a three-ring binder, struggling greatly to not get up and play a game of Free Cell on my computer or go to bed. While on the edge of consciousness, my eight pound gray with some patches of orange semi-tabby cat hopped up on my back and settled in for the duration. How could I now even think of getting up and playing Free Cell or shirking my responsibility even further by going to bed? I would have heard no end of it and probably been required to sleep alone. No, I must push on with my reading, I thought. After all, I was being watched.
In that instant, vivid revelation came to me. Vision was given. Hope for the financial dilemmas of American healthcare was spawned. In that moment it occurred to me that many American hospitals are struggling for survival after only a brief three or four decades of existence at the very same time second hand book shops have existed in Europe for centuries, often passing down through many generations. How could a multi-million dollar hospital filled with experts be compelled to close while a small home-spun book shop could last what seemed like forever? What was the difference that produced this vast extension of institutional survival. I pondered and there it was, the answer in a single small four letter word: cats. Cats? Of course. How could all of the experts have missed it?
Have you ever been in a second-hand book shop in Europe that didn't have a regal striped cat sitting atop the highest book case, watching? The truly productive shops have a second cat, often a white and brown one placed strategically in the window to watch customers, to manipulate them and give them that look that says “If you don’t buy a book, my owner will not be able to afford to go down to the butcher at closing time and buy me scraps for my dinner. Do you want to be responsible for that?” Of course not. No one gets out without buying books. Consequently, bookstores with cats do not have to suffer with non-paying browsers.
I realized in my instant of brilliant insight that every single one of those hospitals that closed had failed to install cats in strategic places to induce the Hawthorne Effect in its labor pool. I mean, if my cat can keep me from Free Cell AND my bed, certainly, a tabby and a brown-and-white, working together, could have saved a hospital from institutional extinction. Can you imagine the political coup that would have been for them, saving all those hospitals and reducing the ranks of the unemployed. Even more importantly, think of what we could do with the problem of burgeoning cat populations in the animal shelters of America. We would be certain to win political votes from the animal lovers of America, if instead of gassing cats at the pound, we gave them an important role in reducing the cost of healthcare and saving our hospitals.
I believe the quality of care would also rise markedly. Patients do so much better when in friendly environments that remind them of home. Can you imagine how much better a patient would feel at the sight of a large tabby roaming around under the rungs of chairs in the waiting rooms or sitting up in the window of a patient room, next to the Gloxinia from Aunt Harriet? There is actually an emerging sub-discipline in medicine called pet therapy. It has been proven that by taking pets into nursing homes, the patients tend to maintain far better mood and actually show enhanced mobility and physical well-being. One study demonstrated that allowing these patients to care for pets increased their life expectancy! Imagine if Fluff was waiting for us when we came out of surgery. Imagine if we replaced the experts with cats.
Besides, Purina Cat Chow is a whole lot cheaper that experts.
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