Critters

It is all our child’s fault. It was her who dribbled a trail of goldfish cracker crumbs that attracted the cat down the street. The critter followed her and the motherly parental unit, cleaning up anything edible which she left in her wake.

Eventually the first cat sort of moved in and we sort of “adopted” her – little did we know her original home just just up the street, and she decided that we were better at serving as her staff than her original family (who moved away a few months later, surprised to find one of “their” cats shacked up with us, but ok with it because they couldn’t take the cats with them).

A year or so later, another cat appeared out of nowhere to stalk the wife and child on their walks. He first took up residence in the yard of the unoccupied house behind us, waiting for – well, waiting for something to eat. We ended up signing on with him too, and he lived a long life as king of the household (and yard, and most of the surrounding couple of blocks).

And so it went – eventually we had six cats, two of which could be called “failed fosters” – which is not at all true. They found their “forerver” home and didn’t have to train new staff.

For nearly ten years we have volunteered at Thundering Paws Animal Sanctuary (the source of all our fosters and most of the standing stock). Herein is a sample of the feline critters who have (and do) live under our roof.

I thought of myself as a dog person, and thought that cats had the basic attitude of “whatever”, that we had more thoroughly domesticated dogs, but cats really couldn’t care less about us.

These critters thought me a lesson or two about affection and connection.