Lessons in Stalking: Adjusting to Life with Cats

Preface

It’s happened. I have become that woman. The one obsessed with cats. Friends no longer put any thought into purchasing gifts for me. If it has a cat on it, they figure (correctly) that I’ll love it. That’s how it starts. People start thinking this way and soon—through no fault of your own—you’re living in a house filled with cat picture frames, cat gloves, cat bookmarks, cat plaques, cat mugs, and yes, even cat underwear.

How cool is that?

We couldn’t have cats growing up because my dad was allergic. We discovered this when we actually had a cat for a few months. Notice the few months part. I inherited my love of cats from my mom and for a while it was a tough call on who would have to leave, Dad or the cat. (Dad won by a nose hair because he didn’t shed on the couch.)

So I couldn’t wait to be an adult and have a cat of my own. But around age 18 I developed allergies. I practically blew up when I was around cats.

Desperate, I tried allergy shots but my allergist warned me I must “never, ever own a cat.”

Then I met Lucy.

She was about three months old, a stray, and playing with a leaf outside a building. It was a November night before the first frost and no one would take her home. I couldn’t bear the thought of leaving her.

“Hey,” I said, “Do you want to come home with me?”

She abandoned her leaf, ran to me, put her tiny front paws on my leg, looked up and said, “Mew.”

Well. I’m only human.

I packed her in my car and drove home. The look on my husband’s face when I walked in the door was less one of surprise and more one of resignation. He’d seen this day coming.

“No, no,” I said, cutting him off. “I know I can’t keep her.

It’s just for a day or two until I find a home for her.”

“Uh-huh,” he said and left the house without another word. When he returned twenty minutes later it was with litter box, food, dishes, and play toys, which he set up in the special “Lucy corner.”

He’s a good man.

And he was right. Lucy never left. Amazingly, I had no allergic reaction to her whatsoever.

This is not true of all cats. Our kitten Olivia makes me sneeze (but she’s so darn cute, I just suck it up).

Lucy is special. All cats are special. And it was obviously meant to be that I have cats in my life. I can’t imagine our home without them.

I hope you have cats in your life. And if you’re so inclined, feel free to send me a cat knick-knack for my home.

One can never have enough of these things.