It’s 3:55 AM when I hear a yowl from downstairs.
The cats are fighting. More accurately, Pluto is trying to attack Tobi. We’ve been dealing with this, on and off, for almost five months. The neighbor’s cat began appearing on our deck in May, and something happened to our cats that I had never heard of before:
Redirected aggression
It happens when a cat becomes aroused, frightened, or agitated by something it can’t directly reach — such as another cat outside the window, a barking dog, or even a loud noise — and then redirects that aggression toward a nearby cat, person, or object.
In this case, Pluto redirects his aggression at Tobi, and it’s awful. It’s violent and nonsensical. Two cats that love each other become instant enemies for hours or days.
It’s been awful for all of us, cats included.
It’s also been much better for more than a month, but at 3:55 AM, I hear them screaming at each other, so I race downstairs to separate them. As I enter the kitchen, I see them run across the counter and stove and sink.
I end up in the back room with the cats. I’m holding Tobi, trying to show Pluto that it’s only his brother. Trying to flip his brain back to normal. Trying to get him to see reality.
Then I smell something funny.
“What is that?” I say aloud.
Then I see. Through a window between the back room and the kitchen, I see it.
Flames.
A fire on the stovetop. Huge flames. At least two feet high. A second later, the smoke detector goes off.
I drop Tobi and race to the kitchen. Two large plastic cereal containers are engulfed in flames. The fire is big, high, and shockingly intense. I take a towel off the oven handle and attempt to smother the flames. The fire goes from nearly three feet high to about a foot as I beat back the flame, but then the towel catches fire.
We have a fire blanket under the sink for this very reason, and a fire extinguisher is located in the basement stairs, approximately ten feet away.
I grab the fire blanket as the flames begin to climb higher and higher again. The smoke is now so thick that I can barely see the stove. I begin coughing. I look at the fire blanket. It’s in a sealed pouch that I have never opened before. I don’t know how to open it. It might take a few seconds to figure it out.
I look to the fire. It’s getting higher again.
Then I remember:
About a month ago, I was consulting at Etsy when I met a guy named Steve. I was teaching storytelling to a team of about 50 people, including Steve, and he shared a story with me about a time his stovetop caught fire. He grabbed his fire extinguisher, pointed it at the fire, and pulled the trigger.
Nothing happened. It failed to discharge.
He tried again. Still nothing.
It turns out that if you don’t shake your extinguisher every three months or so, the contents can become inert and useless.
Steve tried for about 30 seconds to get the extinguisher to work, and that was all the time it took for the cabinets to catch fire.
He lost his home that night. Burned to the ground.
I thought of Steve as I stared at the fire blanket. His story flashed through my mind. I didn’t have time to figure out this pouch and get the fire blanket out. The flames were climbing higher and higher.
Instead, I grabbed a small stack of paper bags from the grocery store that were neatly stacked under the sink. I took those bags and began pounding on the fire, smothering it again and again.
In about ten seconds, it was out.
Paper bags. I used paper bags to put out the fire.
How did I know this would work?
The Boy Scouts. Smothering a fire is always the priority. Even flammable objects, such as paper bags, can do the job.
How did the fire start?
As the cats ran across the stovetop, one of them hit the dial and turned a burner to high. The firefighters later told me that cats have started many fires this way before.
I suffered from smoke inhalation, partially because I stayed in the house too long, opening windows and checking on the cats, who stopped fighting as soon as the fire broke out and sat on the island to watch me battle the blaze.
Charlie later said the fire reset and rebooted them. I think he’s right.
As I was opening windows and inspecting damage, Elysha was rightfully telling me to get outside until the fire department arrived. Thankfully, our alarm company contacted the fire department, and we could already hear the sirens.
Eventually, I listened to Elysha, but not before I managed to breathe in enough smoke to spend the day coughing.
My throat is still sore today.
I burned my hands, too. Nothing serious.
My eyes are still watering a little.
But otherwise I was fine. So, too, are Elysha and the kids, who evacuated. And the house, thankfully, is perfectly fine. In less than an hour, we had cleaned up the mess, and other than the smell of smoke, you never would’ve known anything had happened.
When the firefighter came into the house, he saw the scene. The fire blanket was on the ground beside the stove, unopened. Charred paper bags on the stove and floor. The remnants of a burned towel. Plastic containers burned down to their bases.
“So you had a fire blamet but didn’t use it?” he said.
“I was worried the fire was getting too high, and getting the blanket out would’ve taken too much time.”
He asked me how high the fire had reached, so I showed him, then looked at the blanket again. “So you used paper bags instead?”
“Yup.”
He looked back at the stove again.
“You probably had less than 30 seconds before the cabinets or ceiling caught fire. Then you could’ve lost the house.”
“Really?”
“Absolutely,” the firefighter said. “It happens fast. You probably made the right call.”
Not me. I didn’t make the right call.
It was Steve from Etsy and the Boy Scouts.
The power of a story — unforgettable and specific — and fire safety training, drilled into me relentlessly for years by Scout leaders when I was a kid, saved the house.
I later contacted Steve to express my gratitude.
Quite the morning.
Two fire engines and a police car lit up our neighborhood like a Christmas tree, but happily, they only needed to ensure that the fire was out and everyone was okay.
“Most people would’ve tried to use water, since the sink is so close to the stove,” the firefighter told me.
“That never even occurred to me,” I told him. I told him about my Boy Scout training.
“The Boy Scouts trained you well,” he said.
Elysha often says that she thinks the Boy Scouts taught me more than public school.
“And a bit of advice,” the firefighter said. “Don’t put flammable things on your stove top. Ever.”
I agreed.
Some advice for all:
- Shake your fire extinguishers every three months.
- Practice extracting your fire blankets from the pouch before you need them.
- If you don’t have fire blankets and fire extinguishers, make that investment now.
- When a fire erupts, speed is of the essence.
- Smothering a fire, whenever possible, is the fastest way to extinguish it.
- Remaining calm in an emergency is critical to your survival.
- Listen to your wife when she tells you to get out of the house.
- Don’t place flammable objects on the stovetop.
- Stories are powerful tools for conveying critical information.
- Excellent training early in life might save you decades later.
- Join Scouting.
Also, refrain from blaming the cats for trying to burn down the house. They know not what they do.
