I guess she’s got someplace better to go.
It was just 2 years ago that I began noticing the silhouette at the door. As I entered the living room, in the still dark of the early morning, there was someone sitting there, a shape, at the rear patio door. Wondering who this was, I approached the door, only to have the shape, the being external, shy away from me, moving to the outer edge of the patio. “Who are you”, I asked. No reply.
As days, even weeks went by, most mornings would find that same silhouette at the door sitting there as if waiting to be fed, or given attention. I began lying on the floor, creeping to the door and talking with her. The days were beginning to get some light to them at that hour of the morning and I was able to see just who it was I convened with in this way. She seemed to be a stray. So why was she sitting outside my door. I had never met her. I had been in the apartment for a year and a half prior to her showing up. To me that determined that she had not been left by a previous tenant. I never fed her or gave her water. She wouldn’t let me near her. Yet, she seemed to require something from me. She seemed to be connecting with me for some reason. “Who are you?”
Well, several months after her first appearance, my Lady moved in with me. It wasn’t long before she began to notice my early morning visitor and wondered about her welfare. Soon, my Lady decided that this visitor needed food from us and began to feed her, just a little. Like myself, my Lady began to fall in love with this kitty, this being, this visitor from who knows where. She was a pretty kitty. She had a gray tiger stripe pattern to her coat, a bushy tail, and at a glimpse could even be similar in color and shape of any small raccoon, who frequented our back yard.
Her Cat House
Springtime moved to Summer and eventually to Fall. The temperatures gradually began to grow cooler and the rains slowly began moving in. With us both having grown so attached to Ki-Ki (oh yeah, now she had a name, compliments of my Lady), we wondered about her welfare in what would soon be winter. Ki-Ki now spent most of her time on our patio. She developed the habit of sleeping on a towel or pillow or rug that somehow she had coerced us into putting out for her. I should mention that this kitty was an outdoor cat. In fact, we couldn’t even coax her into the house, no matter the weather.
My Lady was getting rather distressed about how this kitty who had adopted us would fair in the cold and inclement weather. It took no coaxing for me to spend a small amount of time on a Saturday, rumaging through the scrap wood that I had, and coming up with enough to create a shelter for her. A cat house, I suppose you could call it. And, she seemed to take to it straight away. Okay, okay, that felt good to me. Understand that I’m not a cat person, never have been. Yet, this outdoor, low maintenance, stray, independent sweetheart of a feline had indeed found a warm space in my heart.
Well, as winter pursued and Ki-Ki became more inclined to stay close to home, save for the not rainy days, she also began looking a little plump around the belly. We had set up a canopy over the patio, in order that we be able to use the patio, despite the rain. We had placed her abode under the eaves of the roof in order that she be able to stay completely out of the rain. However, she began sleeping on the rug outside of the door, or on the pillow that lived on the chopping block, or in one of the plastic chairs. This seemed to be because I hadn’t allowed much room for expansion and she no longer seemed so comfortable in her cat house.
Anyway, fast forward through the Spring and Summer of this past year and into the Fall, once again. I redesigned her house, expanding it to make her girth more comfortable, and she seemed to take right to it. However, during the course of the Summer, my Lady began feeding a second cat, who we both agreed looked a might gaunt and in need of some assistance. Now, there was a second cat that was hanging at our place and sort of crowding what was a comfortable agreement between Ki-Ki and ourselves to the point of invading the “personal space” that we provided. So, in the course of setting up the wood pile for the coming winter, I fashioned a makeshift, yet effective space for this extra vagrant.
That didn’t work out and it became necessary to find an intermediate home for cat number two. This got things back to normal and with her expanded space and the interloper gone, Ki-Ki settled in for the rainy season. Now, she is spending most of her time hunkered down in her own quarters, only venturing out for her twice a day feeding, a little attention in the evening, or to do what cats do when she needed to, or the weather was without rain and especially for longer times when the sun was out. At this point, she and I had come to place of comfort enough that I could actually pet her, and a couple times get her up on my lap, while sitting outside. She would occasionally follow my Lady in the house whilst she got her food together (though nervously, I should add) and readily spent time on my Lady’s lap, when she would sit outside.
Back to normal, it was, until this recent snowstorm moved in. Ki-Ki had, as I said, become relatively lethargic in the cooler and rainier weather, only venturing out for any length of time on days when the sun was out. So, we both found it pretty odd when, on the day of the snow (a few days ago), she disappeared for the entire day. In fact, as night fell, we both were getting very concerned about her welfare. This was not at all like her, even in fair weather, to not be home for supper, beckoning at the door for her dinner and some attention.
As I mentioned, we do have a number of raccoons who travel through here and indeed will finish any food in the cat’s dish, usually under the cover of darkness. So, that night of the snowfall, I was tending the fire in the fireplace, glancing out the door in hopes of seeing that familiar silhouette. I looked toward her dishes and in the darkness was able to make out the profile of a raccoon. Well, we do regularly chase off the ‘coons, in the event that we catch them helping themselves, and I headed for the door, turning on the outside light in the process. Yup, a raccoon all right. Two, it looked like at first. The second I quickly recognized as Ki-Ki, home and checking out her dishes for food. Yay!!!
Since that day, the temperatures have not risen above freezing and the nights dropping into the teens. What would be the norm is for Ki-Ki to be hunkered down in her own bed most of the time. Not the case. In fact, each day since the snow day, she has been heading off immediately after breakfast, returning long after dusk. We had also recently recognized that she seems to be putting on weight, again, despite our cutting back slightly on her food. It seems that she must be visiting someone else who is feeding her as well.
This morning, she was not at the back door, nor in her house. Her bed seemed cold, though that could surely be the result of the low temperatures quickly erasing her warmth.
It seems that she must have someplace better to go. Is she moving out? Without so much as a “thank you”, “it’s been nice”? Our hearts are feeling the burn of a parent with a child, bound for moving on. Oh well.
Of course, in a couple days we anticipate the rain coming back in, the snow washing away and the weather back to what is a might more normal for this time of year. Maybe our kitty will follow suit.
My Lady is now up and asking if I have seen Ki-Ki. No. Haven’t seen hide nor fur of her, this morning and her bed may have not been slept in. My Lady mentioned that the cat wasn’t around, while she was sitting on the patio last night, either. There is a sadness amongst the two of us, as I finish this writing. We’re feeling like we’ll miss Ki-Ki, if indeed she is moving on.
I look out the door. Oh! There she is!!!
Peter J Quandt