Small Unauthorized Mammal

This is not my cat sitting on my husband.

My 17 year old brother, who by virtue of his age, is a little drain bramaged, err.. brain damaged.   He brought home an unauthorized kitten.  An authorized kitten is trouble enough, but an unauthorized kitten is another thing all together, especially when said unauthorized kitten is found when one is going into the aforementioned brain damaged person's room with the expectation that it is free of small mammals.  In other circumstances, this would be a reasonable expectation, but NOTHING is a reasonable expectation when it comes to the 17 year old male homo-sapiens.   He keeps his clean laundry in his bed, and leaves his dresser empty.  His dresser is used to pile dirty dishes.

So, small unauthorized kitten waltzes out into the rest of the house.  This delights my small girl child and her slightly less small friend.  They proceed to pop the kitten into a laundry basket and haul it around the house.  These are very pleased small girl children.   The promptly named him Skittles, because "he skittles around the place."  I, for my part, do not name the kitten, because to name the kitten is to own a kitten.  For a variety of very legitimate reasons, I am not interested in owning a kitten.  If I had wanted a kitten, I would have brought one home myself!

The dog, Kona, also appears delighted.  She is doing the whole play bow routine and bounding around the house.  She was 120 lbs of pure joy.  She has probably named the kitten, she loves the kitten, she loves everything, everything is made for love!!!  At some point, our adult female cat Shzung, is exposed to the small mammal.  She most definitely has not named the kitten, she hates the kitten, she hates everything, everything is made for hate!!! This kitten is not amused by any of this and does an excellent miniature version of "the Halloween" cat, arched, puffed and hissing.  He really seem unimpressed with all of us, as if he could be picky.

Fast forward a few (writers note: unauthorized kitten just jumped on the lap top and stomped "000" into the middle of this sentence) days, the small mammal is stalking around the house, attacking ankles, bossing my 120 lb dog away from her food dish, chasing Shzung into the basement, trying to eat my cereal, licking up left over spaghetti sauce, and generally owning the place.  Meanwhile, my brother has named the unauthorized kitten "Jack," but "Only if we get to keep him," says the brother.   Ha!  We're not even sure we want to keep my brother!

So, back to the kitten, what I have found very intriguing about him is that he doesn't seem to realize he is small.  As far as he is concerned, he owns me, my house, my animals and my family.  He is offended when I don't allow him on the kitchen table, or to dig his claws into my calves, or dash into the back yard, or pick on Shzung.  Which has lead me to a thought.  What would life be like if I didn't realize I was small?  Not small in physical stature (which I am, and I totally realize that.  The only thing being unaware of my physical stature would lead to is constant frustration that I was inexplicably unable to reach the top shelves) but small as in limiting myself or my ideas about what my life might be.  What if I stopped limiting myself?  What would I do, what would my life be like, what would I do with myself?  What would you do?  I am going to take an art class.