This is Poly — a sweet rescue cat who, for better or worse, is pretty much unstoppable.
So much so, in fact, that even her ideas are contagious.
Not one to shy away from a little rebelliousness, the clever cat managed to find a way around the rules of the house she shares with her owners, Madeline T Stevens-Saadeh, and her family.
But Poly didn’t stop there. She got the family dog, Mila, in on the action, too.
Inside Stevens-Saadeh’s home, there’s a glass door that usually remains closed to keep her pets corralled to the main living space. It became second nature for Stevens-Saadeh to always shut the door behind her, and her pets seemed to realize that meant it was a no-go zone.
One day, however, after entering the room, Stevens-Saadeh saw the door was mysteriously opened — and at her feet stood Poly.
“She taught herself how to open doors,” Stevens-Saadeh told The Dodo.
Thanks to that revelation about how doors work, Poly could suddenly come and go as she pleased — skirting the restrictions that once limited her movements. But, evidently, she couldn’t keep the rebellious new trick all to herself.
As Stevens-Saadeh looked on through the closed glass door not long after, Poly began giving her dog sibling, Mia, a lesson on getting it open.
“Mila sat there and watched her,” Stevens-Saadeh said. “She taught Mila to do it.”
With that, the closed glass door essentially lost all its pet-limiting ability.
“Once Mila figured it out, there was no stopping her,” Stevens-Saadeh said.
But while Poly seemed content with using the new skill selectively, Mila decided to take it even further. Before long, she was opening other doors throughout the house — like this one, leading to the backyard:
The new skill was a clear sign of Polly and Mila’s intelligence. Rebelliousness aside, Stevens-Saadeh was impressed. However, for everyone’s safety, she decided to update the locks on the exterior doors so they couldn’t be so easily opened.
Poly and Mila have been outsmarted — for the time being, anyway.
“They are highly, highly intelligent,” Stevens-Saadeh said. “We love them. They’re family.”