I think of our cats as tiny humans, and I constantly have to remind myself they're not

Ever since Cheddar the cat entered our lives a year ago, this scene has played out hundreds of times.

Cheddar (the orange cat above, lower right) will be sitting in the living room minding his own business, when suddenly calico Ginny, one of our two girl cats, will come charging at him. The two will tussle for a few seconds, hisses will be exchanged, then order will be restored.

When this happens, I give Ginny a stern talking-to. "Why would you do that?" I demand of her. "Stop being a bully. Leave Cheddar alone! You're mean."

Then I pause for a second and realize a few things:

• Ginny does not generally understand English, outside of the word "treats" and her own name.
  
  
• Ginny is acting on instinct. She is not "mean" by nature.
  
  
• These lectures of mine never seem to have an effect, and she is likely to repeat this behavior an hour later.

NOTE: Cheddar is not entirely innocent in all of this. Maybe it's because he's fed up with being attacked, but increasingly, he is the aggressor when he and Ginny or he and Molly square off.

Other than the occasional nose scratch, no one ever gets hurt in these confrontations. But I always feel like Cheddar, a cat who was plucked from the mean streets of Wickliffe by our daughter Melanie, deserves some peace and quiet.

Then again, he's an animal. Does he even know what "peace and quiet" is? Isn't he built to handle this kind of thing?

Regardless of how much we love them, the fact is that our cats, as domesticated as they are, are cats. They have instincts that make them act in ways that, while unpleasant to us, are perfectly natural to them.

Overall, they seem pretty happy with their lives.

This tendency of mine to treat them like people also extends to their facial expressions. Or at least what I interpret as their facial expressions, because again, I read their faces the way I would read people's faces.

Which is also a mistake. Cheddar, for instance, has what Terry calls "Resting Sad Face." He always looks like a forlorn little human child, but he looks that way even when he's sitting on my lap purring and is clearly very content.

So while I still don't like it when the cats fight, as I said, no permanent damage is done and they all seem fairly happy with their lot in life.

Of course, I would know for sure if they stopped being so stubborn and learned to speak English.