One cat just leads to another. The place is so damned big it doesn't really seem as though there were many cats until you see them all moving like a mass migration at feeding time.
Interpretation
The quote reflects the overwhelming presence of experiences or things that may not be apparent until they converge.
In this quote, Hemingway uses the imagery of cats and their gathering at feeding time to illustrate how seemingly isolated aspects of life can suddenly become significant when viewed as a collective. The metaphor suggests that life is filled with numerous experiences, interactions, or challenges that may seem sparse on the surface, yet can swarm together to create a vivid tapestry of existence.
In practice
This quote can be used to illustrate how we often overlook the abundance of experiences we have until we reflect upon them.
He no longer dreamed of storms, nor of women, nor of great occurrences, nor of great fish, nor fights, nor contests of strength, nor of his wife. He only dreamed of places now and the lions on the beach. They played like young cats in the dusk and he loved them as he loved the boy. He never dreamed about the boy. He simply woke, looked out the open door at the moon and unrolled his trousers and put them on.
How did you go bankrupt?" Two ways. Gradually, then suddenly.
When you have shot one bird flying you have shot all birds flying. They are all different and they fly in different ways but the sensation is the same and the last one is as good as the first.
There is never any ending to Paris and the memory of each person who has lived in it differs from that of any other. We always returned to it no matter who we were or how it was changed or with what difficulties, or ease, it could be reached. Paris was always worth it and you received return for whatever you brought to it. But this is how Paris was in the early days when we were very poor and very happy.
Wine is the most civilized thing in the world.
There is no rule on how to write. Sometimes it comes easily and perfectly; sometimes it's like drilling rock and then blasting it out with charges.
I know you're always supposed to want more of everything. But in truth, I'm having a nice ebb and flow of being in my daughter's life every day and getting to keep my work life alive. I'm not nominated for ten thousand everythings every minute, but I am acting and telling stories I love.
Your life is much more important that you can imagine... it is your first treasure.
The only picture I have of my childhood is the picture of me in kindergarten. I have this expression on my face - it's not a smile, it's not a frown. I swear to you, that's the girl who wakes up in the morning and who looks around her house and her life saying, 'I cannot believe how God has blessed me.'
Wake up! If you knew for certain you had a terminal illness--if you had little time left to live--you would waste precious little of it! Well, I'm telling you...you do have a terminal illness: It's called birth. You don't have more than a few years left. No one does! So be happy now, without reason--or you will never be at all.
It's like picking up an unfamiliar piece of sheet music & starting to stumble through it, only to realize it is a melody you'd once learned by heart, one you can play without even trying.
Things that came before, people and things and experiences - that does mean something to me. It doesn't mean I don't embrace the new, but I don't forget the past, either.
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