This one is mostly for JOANADA and all cat lovers.
My wife and I have been married for twenty-eight years this August, and we have had quite a number of cats over the years. All the original cast members are gone, and we currently have a crop that extends back across a fifteen year time line. We currently have four cats. We have had four cats, off and on, for most of our marriage.
Why four, you ask? (yes, I heard you muttering over here) We don't know. Why does the Earth spin counter clockwise? It may have something to do with a piece we read years ago about the correct number of wives for a Sultan to have. One, he said, will be lonely. Two, will be at each other's throat. Three, will become two against one. But four, ah, four is the perfect number. But, whatever the reason, it's stayed at four for a very long time. Without further ado then, meet the team.
Angela
When we moved from Houston to Austin in 1992, our female Siamese-mix, Sirikit, died of a heart attack due to the stress of the move. It remains the first and last time we have used kitty tranquilizers for that very reason.
A few months later we answered an ad in the paper advertising "free" kittens (don't you just love that oxymoron?) from a couple down in South Austin. We went over on a Friday nite, and they had just one kitten left. A very shy little girl with a Tuxedo outfit, sitting on the couch next to her human momma. It was easy to see why she was the last one left, considering she had the "three strikes" against her. Female (yes, I know! I don't understand why that makes a difference to some cat owners but it does), shy, and the runt of the litter. We took her home in a kennel and set up shop for her in our downstairs bathroom. It took her two days before she would come out and explore her new home, and say "hi" to us. Fast forward fifteen years later and she mostly lays around the house, spending time in front of the water bowl (diabetes?), and after the wife gets comfortable for the evening in front of the TV, she'll lay on her lap like a rag doll. She has a good deal of white in her black fur now and walks with that semi-arthritic stiffness but she still gets around.
Harry
Harry was brought home from a friends house by our youngest son, when Harry "accidentally" crawled into his hoodie. He was a flea infested, pusy-eyed, 12 ounce disease bag when my wife saw him. (I was away working a contract in Chattanooga, TN at the time). At first she ordered our son to take him back but she realized that was, basically, a death sentence so they got into the car and off to the vets they went.
We were living in our old house in an eastern suburb of Dallas at the time. They waited until I came home for a long weekend to "ask" me if we could keep him (yeah, as if I'm going to say "no"). When I finished my contract and moved back home to work in Dallas, Harry decided that he was MY cat. Harry spent the early part of his career, beginning in the late '90's, as a "Seven Pet Cat". That is a cat that after you pet them seven times, they start to hiss. The vet says it has something to do with sensory overload, not that they hate you. He finally grew out of it with us, although he sometimes does it to vistors. With us it's all headbuts, and let me lay in your lap. He also sleeps between my legs most nights.
Alfred
Alfred is currently the only kitten I have ever brought home. We had to move out of state after the 9/11 economic collapse and were living in Mobile, AL. Our oldest male, Oliver, had finally succumbed to diabetes and we had a vacancy.
One of our neighbors's cat had a little of kittens. We know this because when they were eight weeks old, they dumped them on the front lawn. (don't you just love ignorant cat owners?) The kittens hung around for about a week when one of the other neighbors collected them up and took them to a shelter. I had noticed a couple of Siamese-mixes in the group but didn't think anymore about it after they were removed.
That Friday, as I was driving down the hill from the main road to our house, I saw one of kits standing by the curb. It was one of the Siamese ones. I stopped my car and thought, "If they come over to me, I'll take them home." As I got out, the kits shied away from me but as soon as I made the "tch tch tch" noise (cat owners will know what I mean) he came right up to me. I picked him up, put him on my shoulder, and took him home to show my wife our new addition. He got his trip to the vet and came back with a prognosis of ear mites, but otherwise good health.
Having had several new guests over the years, we had perfected introducing a new kitten to the group. We set up our guest bedroom and let him spend the first week there. We would take items the other cats slept on and put it in his room and visa-versa. After a week he was parolled and fit right in. He doesn't talk as much as a pure blood Siamese but he does talk. He also has that tight muscle structure that allows him to leap tall refrigerators in a single bound. He likes to be picked up and held like a little baby. Lately he has started sleeping at night between our pillows.
Alfred remains the only cat I have ever brought home.
Intermission: A memorial to CheddarCheddar was an orange tabby, that my wife purposely went out to get. She had always wanted an orange tabby and when she was at PetSmart she found a kitten hanging on the cage and meowing his little heart out. He was definitely mama's favorite, but he would spend time with me as well. He was also Alfred's mentor and best-bud.
He slept with the wife at night on her chest usually under the covers. Unfortunately, she caught a really bad case of the flu a few weeks before Thanksgiving two years ago and passed it on to him. When a cat doesn't feel good they don't eat, and so can start a vicious cycle. By the time we realized what was happenin,g it was too late to do anything for him but to mercifully have him put him to sleep. It was very traumatic for her and took her almost a year to get over it.
Patrick
So, she was in Petco, about a year ago on a Sunday, when she heard a familiar meowing. Petco has pet adoptions on Saturday, so she wondered if it was some kind of recording. Tracking down the sound, she saw a kitten, about six months old, hanging on the cage and meowing his heart out.
She played with him a little bit, made her purchases and came home. She told me about him and I said, "You better go up there and get him or he'll be gone tomorrow." She called Petco and expressed her interest and, by the time she got there, the lady from the adoption center was waiting for her. Turns out that Patrick was a resident of SPCA Second Chance, where they attempt to re-place pets that, for whatever reason, the original adoption did not work.
She brought him home and we installed him in the guest bedroom, which also has a guest bathroom like our master bedroom. He immediately went behind the toilet and stayed there. We left him alone to chill and, over the next few days, would come into the room only to have him run and hide. We finally discovered he would come out if we laid on the floor. We further discovered that the reason for this was he was afraid of feet/shoes. He also seemed to be more fearful of males than females.
After a few days he wanted out and the other cats wanted in so we opened the door to the guest room and left. We saw him sometime later with his head stretched up, eyes wide open, and his paws moving as fast as he could move without running. He was in full-surveillance mode and he was going to scope out the whole house.
Once he settled down and actually allowed us to pet him, we noticed he had a bulge in his tummy area. The vet's diagnosis was that he had a hernia. Hmmmm, wonder if that was why his original owners dumped him? But, after the surgery, we were informed that he already had hernia surgery once before, the inside sutures had not dissolved yet. So, it didn't take much detective work to put two-and-two together and realzed he had more than likely been abused and then discarded.
Fast forward a year later and he has adjusted by leaps and bounds. There's still some deep emotional scars there but we hope that, over time they will all fade away. He and Alfred are not quite the best buds that Cheddar and Alfred were but they romp together and often participate in the great afternoon sleep on mommy's and daddy's bed adventure.
He also plays in the Saturday nite poker game as you see from the picture. He's got a pretty good poker face but whips his tail when he's on the tilt.
The grandkids love Patrick since he's the friendliest one of the bunch. We call him our "Greeter Cat" since he comes to see our visitors as soon as they sit down. He still sleeps on "his bed" in the guest bedroom most nights. When I get up and turn the lights on in the living room, I'll usually see him padding down the hall from his bedroom.
So that's our babies. I apologize in advance for any poor grammar or misspellings but this went on longer than I thought and I don't feel like proofreading it.
See you on the felt.
