Max is Bax...

Max in his new digs in the shop:



So now the question is--what to do with him? I will give him a week or two in the cage to catch up on his eating and sleeping and generally de-stress. Then we plan to introduce him into the shop addition--an area where he will have no rivals and lots of room to patrol. That was our original thought when we first let Max outside.: that he could have free run of the outdoors and have the shop addition for shelter and warmth. In the hope that Max would eventually return, Denny installed a pet flap last month in the wall beside the man-door. But I think we will keep the flap blocked off until Max has had the chance to adjust to his surroundings and the weather gets milder.

All that is in the future.

As to where he's been and what he's been doing, Max remains mum. I know he wasn't two-timing us with a second family because surely someone would have noticed his collar maladjustment and come to his aid. So he has been subsistence hunting since July, perhaps supplemented with the dry cat food I kept available in the shop addition. I know he and Amber's kitty, the fluffy red guy from across the block, disputed the ownership of our lot because we heard the sounds of cats squabbling in the night occasionally during August, then less frequently. Then all we ever saw was the red kitty.

Cold and hunger must have driven Max back to brave his rival. I had heard the sounds of a cat argument Monday morning but when I ran outside to the shop addition and called, no one came running. Still, I just had a feeling--or a hope--that Max would remember where he was sheltered last winter and come back to us.

Max!

I was settling in to watch the evening news and glanced at the camera that monitors our front door. A dark cat was on the porch, drinking from the heated water dish. It wasn't the fluffy red cat that regularly patrols our lot. Could it be Max? Could it?

I crept downstairs to peek out the window, trying not to make any sound lest I send the cat running off before I had a chance to get a good look at him. Leaning over the sink, I could see gray tabby stripes. The next thing I knew, I was throwing open the door and calling his name--"Max! Max! Kitty kitty..."

He made a move as if to jump off the porch until it sank in that I was calling his name, then he turned and came to me. I gathered him up in my arms and took a quick inventory--he was thin but not critically so, and his red collar had slipped to around his chest. It was tight--too tight to unfasten--and later when I had cut it off of him, I could see it had rubbed his fur into clumps around it and there was a patch of dried blood where it had cut into his skin at some point.

Oh my poor Max... I am sure it was a relief when I snipped it off of him, but by then I had transported him to the back room and he was so torn between confusion and joy that he probably didn't notice.

Anyway, I have him settled in the big cage in the shop--familiar to him from the days he spent there last year--with food and water and a bed and litter box all his own. He ate a can of Friskies and drank half the water, then settled in to appreciate warmth and safety.

I slept so well last night--without the half-waking and the worries about where Max was and if he was warm and fed. Finally I knew the answers to those worries.

Mr. Twitch

Frannie

October Spirits

Perhaps it is the energy of Halloween's approach, for I am seeing ghosts today.

You know what I mean. Those little glimpse caught between the corner of your eye and your right brain, so that Jasmine sunning in the window becomes for an instant Red Fred. Just the right combination of sunlight and a deflected gaze. Perhaps my unconscious brain found similarities in the facial structure of the two cats, brought out by a low sun-angle. Perhaps the spirit world draws closer in this season. All I know was that for a second or two, I was looking into Fred's calm face.

Then the angle changed and he was gone.

Later, I saw Dinky, with all her trademark vivacity and fluff, perched on the cat tree giving it a healthy scratch. When I turned to look at her, she was suddenly replaced by Mimi, a sleek short-hair twice Dinky's size. But for a moment I thought of Dinky and smiled.

And of course, any glimpse of orange-y fur brings Punkin back to me. Nashley's broad back in the twilight suggests Punkin's fluff and for a moment she is here with me.

Though I haven't really felt her loss in any but the most superficial ways. I have that pain safely encapsulated somewhere in my psyche to be dealt with later. She was so ingrained in me that it sometimes feels as if she is still here, just out of sight, off sleeping somewhere. But I miss her; her energy and passion and the way she had of being a focus of energy. The love between us endures but we are separated for now.

So I treasure the half-glimpses I have of her--and the others--because it makes it seem as if they are here with me, if only for a moment.

Midge

We haven't had a Midget update in a while. She is doing great. Her fur--shaved off by her previous owner--has grown back to its normal length.

She is lively and indomitable, spending a great deal of her time chasing Lola--or anyone else who will run from her. Although she can't jump very high because of her stiff back, she polices the floor and everything up to about two feet above it.

Lola retreats to the top of the cat tree.

I haven't caught Midge up that cat tree yet, but she somehow managed to climb to the top of the cat tree downstairs.



And she was very proud of herself.

Lola

Clarence's sister--and Bart's daughter--Lola is small-boned and fluffy like her mother. She reminds me of two of my favorite cats. She is small, black and fluffy like our Little Miss Newt with the out-going, Gemini personality of Dinky. She's plenty special on her own, too.