Читать книгу Heart to Heart - Pea Horsley - Страница 19

On Saturday 4 December 2004, I recorded my first practice case study in a large orange hardback notebook. To begin with, I was attempting it without a photo of the animal. All I knew was that the animal was a cat who shared his or her life with a woman called Chloë, who was the casting agent of a friend of mine. I didn’t even have the cat’s name.

I decided to gather some impressions, details that Chloë could verify. I sat in my favourite comfy chair and tried to tune into the cat. I imagined I was connecting with him or her by silently asking ‘the cat of Chloë’ to come forward and show him or herself. Then I saw a quick picture in my mind – the image of a deep rich brown cat. I sensed the general character of this cat and wrote down a few words: ‘gentle’, ‘loving’, ‘weary’, ‘tired’, ‘needs rest’. I asked what he or she was called and heard ‘Molly’, ‘Polly’ and ‘Dolly’.

A few days later Chloë sent me a photo and I found myself looking into the eyes of a deep rich brown cat. I gave myself a tick in my notebook for getting that right. Chloë still hadn’t included a name, so I persevered without one.

‘Please tell me what you’re called,’ I said, as I held the cat’s photo in my hands.

‘Frank. Frankie,’ came a deep male voice inside my head.

‘Is that right? You’re called Frankie?’ My impression had been that this cat was female.

‘No, but I’d prefer this name, I’d rather be called Frank or Frankie. I need more street-cred. But it’s too late now,’ came the deep booming voice.

I’d begun to get a better sense of his character and wrote down a few more words to describe him: ‘bright’, intelligent’, ‘relaxed’, ‘solid’, ‘Other cats leave him alone’, ‘He has quite a presence’, ‘A bit of a gangster, wouldn’t mess with him, but it’s all front’, ‘He has a big heart and adores his mum.’

From his comments it appeared that this puss wasn’t under house arrest and liked to patrol his neighbourhood. ‘How do you leave your garden?’ I asked him. ‘Which direction do you like to head in?’

Suddenly I saw an image of a brick wall on the left of a tiny-looking garden and a ladder – a wooden cat-width ladder, with rungs cat-stride deep, at an easy-to-climb 45-degree angle.

‘She’s made a hole and given me steps,’ said the male voice. ‘I can’t jump that high anymore.’

At the weekend I caught up with Chloë on the phone to check what her cat was called before I continued communicating using her questions. ‘He’s called Sammy,’ she told me.

‘Molly’, ‘Polly’, ‘Dolly’ and ‘Frankie’ had a vaguely similar sound to Sammy, but I knew there was room for improvement, and quite clearly I’d mistaken him as female.

‘Chloë, have you made a hole in the brick wall on the left side of your back garden?’ I asked.

‘Yes, I have … How did you know that?’ she said, astonished.

‘And did you also put a wooden cat-ladder there?’ I continued.

There was a gasp and a moment’s silence on the other end of the phone, then Chloë said, ‘That’s remarkable, Pea. Did Sammy tell you that? How could you have known that? I had to give him a ladder, he was finding it harder to make the jump and he loves to explore.’

I was flabbergasted too. As much as I’d hoped it was true, because it seemed way too quirky for me to invent, the negativity inside me had said, No you’re just making it up, you’ve got a fanciful imagination, cats don’t need ladders to exit their gardens. For goodness sake, he’s a cat!

A week later I was sitting in Chloë’s living room delivering the rest of Sammy’s communication as he sat next to me on the sofa. ‘He never does that with people he’s not met before,’ she said. ‘It’s as if he knows you.’

During home visits animals often give gentle encouragement by climbing onto my lap or settling close by. Sometimes dogs lean into me or uncharacteristically make a big fuss as though we’ve met before. Birds soon relax and let me close too. Animals seem to do this for a number of reasons, mainly, I feel, to give their guardian a clear sign of their approval of the process, but also as a supportive ‘nod’ to me that I am on the right track.