Loyalty

The other morning I woke up for work and seen this.  Pop-eye cuddling my boyfriend (Pop-eye is his cat).  He normally just sleeps next to him or at his feet, he never really clung to his arm the way he is in the picture.  When I seen them like that I just HAD to take the picture because it just made me think of loyalty and love.  A lot people tend to say that dogs are loyaly creatures, which I don't doubt, while cats are not loyal.  I disagree with that.  All three of our cats are loyal to one of us.  Pop-eye is loyal to Tom and Falcor and Orion are loyal to me.   Falcor even comes running when I call for him.  Cats can be just as loyal as dogs.   They are not just loyal to us, their owners but it seems they are also loyal to each other and seems they care for each other even though I know there are people who think animals don't have emotions like humans do.

While I think of the loyalty of our cats I have to wonder if we are as loyal as they are.  Do we stand beside our friends not matter what, do we forgive their faults and love them for who they are, or do we hold grudges that tear friendships apart.  I have lost friends during my battle with cancer, then more when they got married and I remained single.  Friends who said they were loyal to me.  Too often I see people leaving those who care about them, not sticking by them when they needed it most.  How often do we see other people hurting one another for no reason, or over something petty and small.  I read a facebook status of someone losing a friend they were loyal to because the "friend" found out this person was gay.   Cats don't do things like that.  The only way the become unloyal is if you beat them or do horrible things to them.  Cats stay by their owners side, when I was going through Chemotherapy, the cat I had then Cuddles, would wake me up at night and look at me, or she would lay right beside me when I slept after a treatment, she wanted to be close to me and give me comfort.  Why can't humans be loyal as cats or even dogs?  Cats don't discriminate against who they are loyal too, Pop-eye keeps an eye on the door when I keep it open, i don't know if he wants to protect or run when someone comes to the door.  I like to think he wants to protect the house from the outside cats he sees, or those horrible horrible things called birds.

I think the concept of loyalty is often lost on us humans, we tend to think of ourselves instead of thinking about other people, especially those in our lives.  We expect others to loyal to us, but are we ever really loyal to those we expect it from?