That night, around 2 am, I was awakened by a sound that made my hair stand on end. A low, deep growl, like an ancient monster waking up from its long slumber.
"Groooowwwlll..."
My heart was pounding. My mind began to wander to all the possibilities-from a tiger that escaped from the zoo to a mythological creature that decided to vacation in our housing complex.
With forced courage (and slightly shaking hands), I peeked through the window blinds. Outside, under the dim moonlight, I saw...
The neighborhood cats fighting over the remaining fish.
Yes, an epic fight between Si Manis, a white Persian cat who was always pampered by his owner, against Tom, a village cat known as a local thug. They both stared at each other in dramatic poses, like a scene from a Japanese samurai movie.
I laughed at my own fear. How easy it is for our imaginations to run wild in the silence of the night. In fact, the feared "monster" was nothing more than a mini-drama of the cat world that we encounter every day.
Since that incident, every time I hear a growling sound at night, I imagine Sweetie in her graceful style trying to defend her food territory from Tom the street fighter. The fear turned into its own entertainment.
Maybe this is a small lesson that not everything scary at night is really dangerous. Sometimes, it's just the neighbor's cat playing out its life drama. And we, with our wild imaginations, make everything feel more tense than it really is.
Now, every time my friends tell me about mysterious sounds at night, I always remind them: "Make sure it's not Sweetie having a meeting with the neighborhood cats!"
