Familiarity Breeds Comfort

You may recall a very recent post I published in which my cat Josie stubbornly refused to acknowledge the removal of the heated cat-beds from their places in our old house prior to our move. She enjoys lying curled up in those soft, constricted spaces, though how she twists her bulk to fit, I don’t know.

For the first couple of days in the new apartment, the cat-beds were still in their boxes. There was disorder, objects were in the way and I wasn’t sure of where I was going to place anything. The cats at first had to make do with human furniture. Then, at least, the cat-trees were put up, so that the beasts could view their surroundings.

Then, the cat-beds appeared. As soon as I put one on the floor by the base of the tallest cat-tree, in which Josie was reposing, my Chubs made her way down to determine if these were still the same beloved beds from the house. She tested one, and found it an old friend.

It was a little out of the way, however, and Josie would be unseen. So she tried the other one. Gone were the boxes which provided their foundations. Not only was the floor no longer sometimes-chilly wood or linoleum, but a layer of carpeting provided soft insulation. This was just right.

I think the relatively quick application of familiarity helped create a smooth transition from the former environment. First, there was the novelty of the surroundings, some excitement over the new smells, and the new prospects from the windows. But then couches and chairs, books and cabinets were found that provided well-known scents and sights. The shape and number of the rooms may have changed, the sounds were different and the air was definitely filled with new fragrances, but this was clearly home. And in this I was fortunate, because my Chubs’s patience with disruption doesn’t last for long.