Here’s my cat sleeping in the dresser, something I strictly forbade.

If you and your significant other are cat owners, you know what I’m talking about when it comes to the good cop/bad cop dynamic that occurs while raising your feline friends. I guess the same applies to dogs and even children as well, but essentially one individual maintains the guise of a stern disciplinarian while the other is considered the “cool” parent.

My wife happens to be the cool parent when it comes to our cats, which leaves me the boring grumpy guy who’s always telling Scuffles and Snuggles to stop acting so childish and find jobs. This is a natural instinct for me, which is strange considering that I don’t tend to take a whole lot of things serious when it comes to life. However, my brain just can’t stand irresponsible behavior from my cats, even if it means that they’re significantly more excited to see my wife when she gets home after work.

I guess I could be jealous of their relationship as being the cool cat parent seems like so much fun. Whenever their cat friends come over, they’re always like “Hey Mrs. M, what’s shaking?” while avoiding the black hole of enjoyment that is yours truly. Where are my cat high fives, where are my greetings in the street? I always imagined myself in the opposite light; wearing leather jackets,riding motorcycles and beating up the other cat dads when their respective cat children claimed they were tougher than me.

I feel bad about this sometimes, often contemplating whether or not I should just lose the tough guy act and treat my cats more like friends and less like the tiny lifeforms in need of molding that they are. Should I take the catnip away and lecture them on the downward spiral their lives are taking or sit down and smoke (?) a bowl with the gang? While the latter would be easier, two cat parent friends does not equate to upstanding cat citizens and there are way too many street cats roaming out there cold and alone for me to ignore the consequences of poor parenting.

Perhaps that’s a bit strange as my motivation for keeping the cats in line is to insure they can fend for themselves when in actuality they will never move out and never get jobs of their own. In fact, by declawing them (which I should add was my wife’s idea yet they blame me) has more or less guaranteed that they could never survive outside of our home. Besides, no amount of life lesson teaching will prompt them to do anything outside of licking their own butts, eating and sleeping all day. Additionally, they don’t listen to me anyway and constantly flaunt their lack of respect directly in my face. They literally drink out of water cups that I pour for myself should I step away for too long.

Despite all of this, I stick to my gameplan in hopes of one day fostering responsibility in them. Sure, I may never be a cat DILF but I can rest peacefully at night knowing that I’ve done my best and in the end, that’s all you can do.