What if my cats had real jobs?

You know how you can sometimes just look at someone and have a pretty good idea of what they do in life? People can always tell that my 6’1”, broad-shouldered, no-nonsense husband is a police officer, while no one has ever looked at my child-sized frame and guessed that I’m a lumberjack (I’m not).

But physique aside, we can generally pick out which character traits would make someone good (or terrible) at a certain job. My extroverted cop husband has all the necessary qualities to do his job effectively and efficiently that my introverted, scared-of-everything self does not.

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And so, just for fun, I thought about what my three cats might be if they actually had jobs other than keeping me company and showering me with affection (which some of them are better at than others). I couldn’t exactly ask them to fill out a career assessment questionnaire — you know, because they lack opposable thumbs and all — so I’ve taken the liberty of assigning them each a job based on years of careful observation.

Skinny Mini: Kindergarten teacher

Skinny Mini the Sphynx would make a perfect kindergarten teacher because she’s great with kids. I got Mini as an adult from a wonderful breeder here in France, who explained that Mini had been an excellent mother to all her kittens. She went on to tell (warn?) me that Skinny Mini was energetic, loved being in charge, and was rarely quiet. A few hours after getting her home, I texted the breeder to tell her she was right.

With all those qualities, teaching young children would be a great fit for Skinny Mini. She’s very intelligent, fun, attentive, has endless energy and she knows how to keep everyone in line (I hear little kids can get kind of rowdy). And considering she’s on the floor licking her nether regions as I type this, I doubt she’d be adverse to cleaning up a little puke, pee or poop from time to time. As long as she doesn’t drag her claws across the chalkboard, I’m sure the kids would love Ms. Mini!

Fly: Bartender

My second Sphynx, on the other hand, is pretty much the opposite of Skinny Mini.

I got Fly from the same breeder as Mini and was told that, “She’s a lovely girl, but not terribly smart. Oh, and she wasn’t a great mother- most of the time she didn’t even realize she had kittens.” Needless to say, Fly never won Mother of the Year, nor would she make a great kindergarten teacher.

No, I definitely see Fly doing something fun and social where she can work at night and sleep all day, as is her preference. Fly likes to flit around and keep herself busy, but she’s also easily distracted. She LOVES water, so I thought that maybe she’d be a good lifeguard, but I’d worry she’d see a drowning child then take off after a butterfly instead. She seems to have a good memory (remembering days later where I’ve hid my bobby pins and hair elastics), and so perhaps she’d make a great bartender at a classy French bar or discoth├¿que.

Bartenders tend to be very sociable and friendly people who don’t mind working at night. They have to remember a whole bunch of cocktail recipes and be awesome enough to make the patrons want to keep coming back and ordering drinks. With her slim, leggy build and big blue-green eyes, flirty Fly would be a hit with the guys. She’d be the kind of bartender that men would come in specifically to see. They’d hang over the bar asking, “Hey, is Fly working tonight?”

Fly could serve drinks at night, rack up a ton of tips thanks to her winning personality and supermodel good looks, then come home and sleep all day. She’s not the mothering type, and so she’d enjoy a single and free lifestyle, using her tip money to go on exotic trips all over the world and living it up with her girlfriends on her nights off.

(Excuse me while I go live vicariously through my cat for one second.)

No├®: Working from home

So with Skinny Mini teaching tots and Fly mixing martinis, that leaves me with No├®.

No├® is neither energetic nor outgoing. He’s a pleasantly plump, socially awkward homebody who hates loud noises and changes to his environment. He likes to do things on his own time and is happy to mingle when he’s in the mood for it, otherwise, he wants to be left alone to sleep or contemplate life.

As such, I think No├® would be an entrepreneur, or possibly unemployed. He seems to be lost in thought a lot of the time, so he maybe he could be a writer, holed up in his home office, alternating writing with napping and generally keeping to himself.

(Wait, am I describing my cat’s fictional life or my real life here?)

He’s a sweet but diabetic guy whose day is regulated by his insulin shots and meal times, which means he’d be most comfortable working from home. And unlike his Sphynx siblings, No├® thrives on routine, familiarity and solitude. If he ever got tired of working at home, I’m sure he’d easily find something that required being left alone in a cubicle all day entering data.

Of course cats don’t have professions, but it’s fun-slash-silly to think about how they would make a living out there in the “real” world. All I know is that if my cats applied for a job that required them to be adorable and loveable, I’d hire them all on the spot with a great salary and benefits package!

We want to hear from you: What would your cat do for a job?

All photos by Crystal Gibson

About Crystal Gibson: A child-sized Canadian expat in France who is fluent in French and sarcasm. Owned by a neurotic Doxie mix, a Garfield look-alike, and two needy Sphynx cats. An aspiring writer and pet photographer with a love of coffee and distaste for French administration, she can be found blogging over at Crystal Goes to Europe.