Letting the Cat Out of the Bag

Before I get to my confession, let’s have a little fun with this phrase we toss around all the time:
“Letting the cat out of the bag.”

It actually goes back to old marketplace days when a farmer would sell a piglet… and a few sneaky sellers would swap the pig for a far less valuable animal — a cat — and tie the bag shut.
The moment someone opened it and discovered the truth?
Surprise! The cat was out of the bag… and so was the secret.

So in that spirit of honesty — without any farming fraud, I promise —
I guess it’s time I open the bag on my little truth:

I don’t like cats.

There, I said it.
My lungs said it years ago.
Asthma and cats have never been a power couple.

But here’s the twist that even I didn’t see coming:
I love painting them.

Yes.
Me — the woman who breaks into a polite wheeze when she even looks at a litter box — has fallen head over paintbrush for creating watercolor cats.

And it all happened so innocently.
I painted one for a loved one who lost her cat last week.
Then I painted another today — a cat I’ve never even met, mind you — wrapped in a purple scarf like he’s auditioning for Feline Winter Vogue.

Somewhere between watercolor layers and whisker highlights, I realized:
I may not be able to pet a cat…
but apparently I can paint one with great enthusiasm.

Maybe that’s the real magic of art —
it lets us adore things from a safe, sneeze-free distance.
It lets us borrow someone else’s love for a moment and turn it into something meaningful.

So yes, the cat is officially out of the bag:
I’m not a cat person…
but I am apparently a cat painter.

I saw this cute fella on Pinterest and decided to paint him, all credits go to the original artist.

And honestly?
That feels like a pretty adorable plot twist.