Children and Cats

Settled into Hobart now, I finished Bruno Munari's book 'Design as Art' during my first week here. Within the helpful chapter on Children's Books he states;

'Knowing children is like knowing cats. Anyone who doesn't like cats will not like children or understand them. Every day you see some old woman approach a child with terrible grimaces and babble idiocies in a language full of booes and cooes and peekiweekies. 

Children generally regard such persons with the utmost severity, because they seem to have grown old in vain. Children do not understand what on earth they want, so they go back to their games, simple and serious games that absorb them completely.

To enter the world of a child (or cat) the least you must do is sit down on the ground without interrupting the child in whatever he is doing, and wait for him to notice you. It will then be the child who makes contact with you, and you (being older, and I hope not older in vain) with your higher intelligence will be able to understand his needs and his interests, which are by no means confined to the bottle and the potty. He is trying to understand the world he is living in, he is groping his way ahead from one experience to the next, always curious and wanting to know everything.'

I took this photo of our neighbours cat sitting in our garage/carport yesterday. I don't know his name yet but it's a nice cat who loves our yard, and house too. I waltzed in and interrupted him though, sorry!

I will look for vintage Munari children's books.