Fumi the Destroyer 
BC
I’m sure you know by now we have two cats living with us. Both are tabbies (presumably of the American short hair variety); while they might look similar at first glance, when it comes to personality, each couldn’t be more different.
First there’s BC, which stands for Barn Cat (or Best Cat, Buddy Cat, Big Claws, or occasionally for Bonehead Cat). A few years ago someone dumped him at the rented barn where we kept our horses. As he made the barn his new home, we immediately fell in love with him. As sweet as he is, it didn’t take us long to see he’s one heck of a mouser, able to strike with speed and accuracy.
I fondly remember the first time I met him while visiting the stable. As soon as I exited the car, he greeted all of us with a flurry of friendly meows. In typical feline fashion he proceeded to “herd” us by leading my family and I over to his bowl and large bag of cat food. Understandably, after this warm introduction you can imagine how happy I was six months later when I heard the news he’d relocated to Boulder’s Farm along with our horses.
Nowadays, BC patrols our farmhouse for rodents and serves as the farm’s unofficial goodwill ambassador and lap-warmer-in-residence. Like many felines, he sleeps a lot, leading me to believe he’s an older cat, but since he’s kind of a rescue, no one really knows how old he is. (Other than slicing him open and counting the rings I have no idea how to determine his exact age.) He has a sweet disposition and purrs so softly it’s almost inaudible. As cats go, he’s not very vocal but he’s known to meow plaintively when hungry or left alone in the kitchen. I’ve also witnessed BC exhibiting canine-like qualities such as following me around or sniffing my coat and backpack.
Trust me, he’s a great cat.
And then there’s Fumi. Without a doubt, she’s one of the prettiest cats I’ve encountered. We acquired her early on through one of Draven’s friends (who probably named her after an anime character). Fumi immediately went to work decimating our farmhouse’s out-of-control rodent population, quickly earning the epithet, “the Destroyer of Rodents”.
She generally dumps the corpses of her prey in an empty cardboard box in the living room we’ve nicknamed the “murder box”. Judging by the number of “kills” she leaves for us in the morning, she does her best work at night while we’re asleep. Even during the day, I’ve seen her scurrying about with a mouse or even a small garter snake in her mouth. Recently, she escaped outside long enough to take down a gopher and haul its corpse inside as a trophy for us to admire.
Personality-wise, she’s the polar opposite of BC. Whereas BC is a rock of placidity, Fumi is downright manic. Frequently, in the early evenings, she’ll tear-ass around the farmhouse, growling for no reason whatsoever other than to amuse us and blow off steam. Like a high-performance race car, able to go from zero to sixty in 2.5 seconds, Fumi can be curled up in your lap purring away and in the blink of an eye trying to scratch you into a bloody pulp.
Don’t get me wrong: she’s not evil; she’s just… well… unpredictable.
The more I reflect on personality quirks of our two resident felines, the more I suspect there’s a deeper life lesson waiting to be learned. Perhaps cats are like people in that you immediately take a liking to some and end up loving them to death. Others might drive you nuts, but they also possess qualities you grow to admire. Best then to just accept both cats and people for who they are.
I’m reminded of the great Persian poet Rumi, who once declared that a person who exhibits both positive and negative qualities, strengths and weaknesses, is not flawed, but complete.