The Missing Cat

The cat joined our family as a three year old stray which shelter described as ‘a nervous little girl’. 'Nervous little girl' is a polite way to say that we were adopting a psycho with three years worth of untracable history.

Three years of untracable history wasn’t necessarily what I was looking for in a cat to add to our hormone-raging family mix.  But, the moment we set our eyes on her, we were smitten. I won't even attempt to explain ‘love at first sight’ and the dumb irrationality that goes with it.  

The moment we realized she had thumbs (!), we knew we could never go back.

All the way home she wailed like a tortured baby goat driving other occupants of the vehicle to near madness. As soon as we arrived home and opened the carrier she clambered out, bounced into the study and wedged herself solid between the bookshelf and the couch. The fact that she chose the study and the bookshelves as her safe place made me forgive her for driving us mad on the ride home and love her even more.

The first week or so, she spent in deep hiding. When I say, ‘deep’ I mean ‘really deep’. So deep that one day we thought she escaped during our crazy early morning routine when kids were rushing out to catch the school bus, accidentally leaving both the laundry room and the garage door wide open.

All that day I searched for her in every possible and impossible corner, crevice, hole, crack, dryer and exhaust vent in our house and found nothing. I finally alerted our neighbors who proceeded to organize a search party eventually returning to their respective homes empty-handed.  

In hope to coax her back I followed a recommendation I found on-line and scattered her litter box content around our house and all over the flower beds! I know how it sounds... I am shaking my head just thinking about it. Our house was stinking like a giant litter box for days...

Still to no avail!

Exhausted and emotionally depleted we were sitting on the couch late that night staring blankly in the direction of moving images on our TV, when my husband exclaimed,

LOOK - the Cat! 

What cat? I mumbled too disoriented from the events of the day.

Swaying her hips like a fresh-baked diva, her soft fur aglow in the artificial light of the TV she strolled in front of us as if it's the most normal thing to do on her way to the bowl with food and water. She didn't dignify us with a single look.

I thank God we were too exhausted for an emotional reaction. We just looked at each other, glad we didn't have enough energy left in us to strangle her for almost giving us heart attack, and just enough left to feel the relief that she was safe.

And we loved her all the more because she was found although in reality she was never lost.