Wednesday, April 13, 2011

K is for Kitty Door

When I was in college, I lived alone at my dad's house in a rural area while he worked out of town.  I had a field mouse (which is a story for M day).  I caught one mouse in a trap and had a terrifying experience poisoning another. I will most assuredly come back in my next life as a poisoned mouse with a trap on my tail.

My aunt suggested I get a cat.  I did, which took care of the mouse problem.  The cat drove me crazy and made me sneeze.  It attacked my feet while I tried to sleep and loved to walk on my books and papers while I studied and wrote papers. 

My dad thought I definitely needed a kitty door in the garage so my cat could come and go as it pleased.  I'm not sure why he thought it needed to go out since I was trying to make it an inside cat, preferably a mouse-eating indoor cat.  My dad is like that.  He likes to come and go.  I imagine he just felt bad that the cat was trapped inside.

The thing about kitty doors is they do not discriminate.

One day I opened the door that led from the house to the garage to bring my cat inside.  The second I called my kitty's name, the place was crawling with cats.  It was an infestation.  I shut the door very quickly.  Eventually they left, and my kitty soon had some kitties of her own.  I moved out soon after that.  My dad's neighbors, an older couple, kindly took care of my cat and her babies.
  
For the animal lovers out there, I know I should have had my cat fixed, but I didn't know that back then.  I'm glad now that I didn't because her babies made my elderly neighbors so happy.  I remember them sitting in the yard letting the kittens crawl all over them.  The thing that I get now, nearly 25 years later, that I didn't get then is Helen had Alzheimers.  The kittens were a blessing for her and her husband.  They spent hours playing with them outside at a time when their lives were quite likely very difficult and when Helen otherwise stayed inside.  I remember Gene thanking me with the biggest smile on his face, a smile I had never seen before.  At the time, I didn't understand why the kittens were such a gift to them.  I understand now.

4 comments:

  1. A wonderful story! It's so nice that the kittens were able to help that couple. Thanks for finding me. I look forward to seeing you again. Julie

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  2. Oh, I bet kitties are GREAT for an Alzheimer's patient--who can resist them? You know they DO make kitty doors with openers that react to a collar... I knew a guy in Portland who had a cat and kept coming home to these big cat parties... he bought one of those doors and put the coller on his cat, so only he could come and go... everyone else he partied with had to stay outside...

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  3. @Shelly - Thanks! :)

    @Empty Nest Insider - Thank you. This challenge has been a fun way to "meet" other people.

    @Hart - This happened around 1987...we definitely had a low-tech kitty door. I'm glad they improved them. :)

    Thank you all for visiting. My apologies for being behind responding to comments.

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