FLIRTING

Audrey C. Tiernan
Every day, this little feral black cat that I have named Cashew comes to flirt with my indoor cat Slugger. For weeks I tried to ignore her dances on the window sill, her piercing yellow eyes that are still peering into my kitchen late at night. But her persistence and personality have won me over. She won’t let me touch her yet, although each morning when I take her breakfast she flirts with me, letting me get just a little bit closer. Slugger, well, he acts mighty territorially. He bats at the window and sometimes even hisses. After a few minutes, he is completely put out and turns his back on her. But sometimes, real early in the morning, before the kitchen light is on I see him sitting gazing out the window looking for Cashew. As I watched this all play out in front of me one day, I thought about flirting. My camera flirts with situations every day. It flirts with angles and the ever elusive light and shadow. I flirt with ideas--- the things I’d like to photograph and the places I hope to document. Flirting, it’s everywhere. It’s instinctive.