This light had me thinking about language. I'm a well educated Superior and have come into contact with many Longlegs. Over time there seem to have been Longlegs visiting from all parts of this globe. I have heard the mangled English of America, the gutteral German, the temptation of Italian and the relaxed tones of Spanish. I've heard the Urgency of French, the leadership of Portuguese, the sing-song of Chinese and the melody of Welsh. I've heard those and more but it always surprises me that no Longlegs ever talks the Miaow language of Superiors. Nor have they one language understood the World over the way Miaow is. I can meet and greet a Superior from any part of the World because he speaks the same language as me. This is of course just further proof of why we are Superiors. They have to learn new languages all the time to communicate.
All this of course made me wonder about education and whether that's what sets us apart from the Longlegs. Just listen to this.....they send their kittens away to be educated ! Yes it's true, they go out in the light time and come home before the dark time and they go and learn things in large groups. I've heard of some things they learn like counting, that's good but you only need count things like the claws on your paws really. They learn reading, which for them is good because they send things to each other in writing. They learn about other Countries, which is good if you live there but why bother if you only live here? They learn things which are useful like the females learn to cook my chicken and the males to build houses for me to live in, but that's only because we Superiors have decreed it thus for our own needs, after all the Longlegs have the opposing thumb we don't have. Yes, I'm sure that's just something else we Superiors decreed.
What the Longlegs don't have is the instinct we are born with. What they don't have is a Superior's education given by a parent of how to stalk and catch food, of how to organise Longlegs to do things for us. And this is given at home with no need to send us away during the light time. Our lives are far less complicated.
One thing we should envy the Longlegs though is life. We have nine lifetimes to learn things and start very early whereas the Longlegs live many more lifetimes. They start learning late but keep learning all the time so they may actually serve more than one Superior during that time. It would be nice if we had more than our nine lives so we could keep training the Longlegs under our care though I'm not sure I'd want to live the hundreds of years they do, after all I've seen what happens to their fur when they get old, it disappears and they have try and comb what's left to cover the patches. I certainly wouldn't want that as my fur is luxurious. Everyone should be as jealous of my fur as they are of my wit and charm, my education and training skills. Talking of which, it's time I put my language skills to good use and suggested to my 'The Him' that he fills my dish with chicken.
Wise Cat
An ancient Haiku about our beloved universal language:
purrr, a soft miaow,
shall I tell you about beauty?
listen to my song…
Lisa
Dear Oscar,
I am a Longlegs, a teacher by profession. I wish the world of human education would consult Superiors like you. I cannot even begin to tell you about the chaos in my classroom that is generated each day by the human kittens. They are good little kittens – I love every one of them – but really, learning in large groups is not the thing. They want to follow their parents, learn from experience, and develop wisdom in the proper way. We need a Superior Reform for our schools!
Regards,
Lisa, a first grade teacher
Julia Prosser
([email protected]) Wed, 19 Oct 2011 05:50:17
eek I am a longlegs getting old, thanks Oscar.