Stories about our Beloved Cats

 

Critter's Rescue (Diva)

In 1991, young Henry (about one year old) and I were living in a garden-level one-bedroom apartment in a small eight-unit apartment house. The day we chose the apartment I noticed a tiny black kitten in the window of the rear garden level apartment, and I hoped this would be Henry's friend. (Henry is a very friendly cat - when he was younger, he'd do "sleepovers" with my neighbors' kids and cats and come trotting downstairs with them in the morning just as if he lived there.)

Sure enough, Henry and the scrawny little black kitten did become friends. Henry invited her over to eat from his bowl, and to play, and to lick each other's heads and take naps together, but the kitten would not let me - or any other human, for all I know - come near her. Soon she was spending nearly all her time in my apartment. She always seemed to be starving.

This went on for several months, but I never did get to know those neighbors, since they were rarely home. I started calling Henry's little pal "Critter". As the weather changed to winter, Critter spent even more of her time at my place. Then I got a job offer I could not refuse in Fort Collins, about 60 miles away. I found a nice townhouse and moved my stuff right before Christmas. I lodged Henry at my then-boyfriend's (now husband's) parent's huge old house, until I could get settled and bring him home - at most, a few days time.

Meanwhile, I went back to my old apartment to clean it, and there was poor Critter - skinny, shivering, and huddled by my door, wondering where her Henry friend was. I let her in, and she searched every room for her pal, still not allowing me to pet her. When I left, I had to put her out again, and I went upstairs to leave the key with my other neighbor. She told me that the little black kitty had been hanging around my door crying piteously since we'd left. She told me that she'd once seen the guy of the neighbor couple she was supposed to belong to kick her for crying. She told me, that unless I took the poor little thing with me, she'd take it to the pound, because she couldn't take her in (she had a new baby) and she didn't want it to freeze, starve, or be kicked to death.

This seems like such an obvious decision now, but at that time, I was torn. This was not my cat. I've had cats stolen from me before, and I've had cats go missing. It would be wrong for me to steal this cat, wouldn't it? So I decided to knock on the evil allegedly cat-kicking neighbor's door and see what could be done.

"This little black cat," I said, "Is she yours?" "She's my wife's," he said. "What's her name?" "Doesn't have a name." "Well, she's been hanging around my place a lot, and I have to move, and my cat loves her. Would you consider letting me adopt her?" "Have to ask the wife." "When will you have an answer, any idea?" "Don't know." "In the meantime, could you let her in? She's bothering the other tenants, and she sure looks hungry, and it's cold out here." "Grunt. She doesn't want to come in." (No mystery there, I thought.)

So I left. As I pulled away from the curb, there was little black Critter, not even a year old, standing at the edge of the shoveled sidewalk, next to a two-foot drift of snow, crying after me piteously to come back and bring her friend Henry, the only creature in the world she loved and trusted. Oh, I felt like such a cruel person. But how could I steal someone's cat?

The next day, as soon as I was reasonably sure the Evil Cat-Kicking Neighbors who didn't even care enough to name a kitten had gone to work, I put a carrier in my car. I parked in the back alley for a quick getaway. I crept to my former back door, where Critter was waiting, shivering, crying. I scooped her up and I managed to stuff her tiny body in the carrier before she could get away. I put her in the car. I left a note with my good neighbor, telling her if the Evil Ones ever asked about the cat, here is my new address and phone. I jumped in the car and drove away.

Critter's Hostage Photo (Diva)

Ironically enough, the SU (spousal unit) and I eventually moved back to Denver and now live (own a house - well, the cats own the house and let us live here, you know what I mean) within six blocks of my old apartment. Critter appears to have no memory of those days, although she still exhibits some psychic scars - has a limited acceptance of kinds of food she'll eat (to her, canned food is ambrosia, she shuns leftovers of fish and shrimp and other goodies), doesn't like strangers, and she rules the roost here to a certain extent - there is no clearcut hierarchy among the four cats, it's rather a very complicated geo-political network, but NO ONE messes (seriously) with Miss Critter.

One time, when we were struggling to support ourselves while we wrote our last book, we lived with the inlaws for seven months, with three cats including Critter. She disappeared for two weeks that summer, and in the midst of her absence, my FIL had a heart attack. Critter was his favorite cat, as he said, "Critter has her own agenda, she is a fully self-realized cat." (He's a psychiatrist.) Imagine elderly dignified psychiatrist chasing Critter and not-quite-dead sparrow she'd brought him around his consulting room just before a patient was due to arrive - one of his favorite stories.

While he was in the hospital, we found Critter - who had been masquerading as a stray to get better food. We told him, in the hospital, that Critter was home again, but he didn't believe us, thought we'd made it up so he'd feel better. So we took a "hostage picture" of Critter with that day's edition of the newspaper, via Polaroid, and this cheered him up no end. He came home soon after.

That little black cat, it's amazing the lives she has touched, and she's not even all that charming. She's just Critter. She has her own agenda.

Ellie (Elaine Moser)

Ellie.....

In October of 2001, we got two little sister kittens, Mia and Ellie. They loved to roughhouse--we called it "Smackdown". Mia was more the adventurer (she lept out of my arms when I first held her and began tearing around the pet shop leading the poor sales clerk on a merry chase) and Ellie was the quiet observer--and the sweetheart.

At around 5 months or so, we started to notice that Mia was growing faster than Ellie. About a month later we took Ellie in because she seemed to be running a fever. A week later, when she seemed to be getteing worse instead of better, we took her in again. The local vet wasn't sure what was wrong but said that she was very anemic and needed a blood transfusion. That required a 3 1/2 hour car trip up to a special clinic in Portland the next morning. Ellie travelled up in a cardboard cat box, and when I let her out of her box after we got to the parking lot she sat on my lap for a while. She was very tired but seemed very happy to be with me.

In the clinic they diagnosed Ellie with FIP (Feline Infectious Peritonitis) which has no cure or effective treatment. They said that the transfusion would probably only improve her condition for a short time and they recommended euthanasia. I couldn't face losing her then, and I had promised my husband that Ellie would come home with me that evening. So we went ahead with the transfusion, hoping that somehow she would be the one kitty to beat the odds.

In the car driving home I couldn't bear to make her stay in the box so she sat on the front passenger seat. She slept for a while (I kept checking to make sure she was still breathing) and then she abruptly woke up, sat up and started talking to me--meow, meow. I figured she was trying to tell me that she felt much better and was enjoying the ride. It was a very bittersweet and memorable trip back home for us.

Unfortunately, she only lasted another 9 days before passing on. We were devastated. It was so much harder than the death of any of my other pets over the years, because she was so young. I tried to write a eulogy for her here, but I just could not do it...

Fast forward to last month. These days I'm working down in LA and commuting up to Oregon once or twice a month to be with my husband and cat (Mia) and dog. This time I'm driving up to celebrate my birthday with the family.

Somewhere along the I-5 in the Central Valley, as I'm driving along , zoning out, Ellie comes and sits in the front passenger seat of the car, just like she did on her last trip home from the clinic.
It wasn't that I was thinking about her at that time. I wasn't. I was just suddenly aware that she was there. I've never had an experience like that--I tend to be overly rational and logical if anything---but she WAS THERE. I just knew. I didn't see her so much as feel her.

She talked to me and let me know she was happy where she was. I told her about her sister Mia, and how she's done so well on her cat skills--climbing trees, stalking lizards and mice; manipulating the dog into chasing her. I told her I was sorry that she (Ellie) didn't get a chance to develop those skills.

She said it was OK; she had learned other skills. She knew how to sing. She sang me a cat song. Its hard to describe what it sounded like, but it was the most heartbreakingly beautiful thing I had ever heard. I cried tears of joy. My heart felt like it was bursting.

Later on I put on an Enya CD and Ellie sang some cat harmony. She stayed with me for a while until she had to leave.

It was the sweetest birthday present I ever received. I hope someday to see her again and hear another cat song. I'm so glad she's in a happy place. I'm so grateful that she came to visit me.

I love you, Ellie.

Wooly's Rescue Story (Julie D.)

My boy and I were leaving a Durham Bulls game with a couple of friends and their new baby and we heard kitten crying form the bushes as we were walking up a hill, next to the Freeway, to our car. So we called it out and this gray fuzz ball came out of the bushes and rubbed up on my legs. She let me pick her up and she was purrrring. She was covered in prickers....so, I didnt' want to leave her hanging out next to the highway, so I took her home, thinking I might take her to the shelter the next day, but she was sooo cute and she made gremlin noises when she was eating the wet food we gave her, so I took her to the vet the next day and got her shots and check up and all that. I decided to name her Wooly, sort of after the Bulls mascot, Wool E. Bull. We had seen her mom take off across a busy intersection after we took her to our car, so I felt guilty, but my vet told me that she was definitely not cared for my a human, and had worms/parasites her her stomach...so that it was ok that I took her home. So, since them it's been up and down, she's the cutest thing ever when she's asleep, and can jump 4 feet up the wall when chasing the dot of laser light...these are the cute things...She has her own box, which she does not use. She poops more than any cat I have ever seen. Seymour has always been sort of dainty about it.