Meowy Monday – Two National Cat Holidays

If you’re into celebrating cats, today should be a good day for you. Not only is it National Take Your Cat to Work Day, it’s also National Garfield Cat Day.

National Take Your Cat to Work Day. Now that’s an interesting concept. How many of us have a cat that would enjoy or even tolerate being taken to work at an office downtown or a hospital or gift shop or restaurant? How would it work out in your work environment? I can’t think of any cats I’ve ever had that would allow it—and think of the chaos an unwilling cat could create at a workplace.

But many of us with cats work at home, so cats are in our workplace all the time, every day, twenty-four hours.

Most of the writers I know have cats. Writers and cats just kind of go together. It works for me and it has for fifty years. But there are many other types of “cottage” businesses where cats reside and watch over the work their people do. With the advent of the pandemic and isolation, millions of workers brought their work home amid busy households with children, dogs, gerbils, and, of course, cats. And for many of them there were definitely adjustments to be made.

However I also know a couple of cats that would enjoy accompanying their person to their workplace. I’ve never been blessed with such a cool and calm cat.

Then there are cats with jobs—cat greeters in bookstores, feed stores, nurseries, and other places of business. There are therapy cats working in nursing homes and places of high stress such as airports. Have you heard about Duke Ellington Morris? He was found starving in a cat colony and rescued. When his FURever family realized what a special cat he is, they decided he could be a helping cat and he is. The Duke is now part of the WAG Brigade at the San Francisco Airport as a therapy cat for passengers. He’s so adorable in his uniform.