This was originally several separate posts over more than a year, which I’ve whittled down and sewn together into one long entry. It’s too many words, sorry, but I love my cat and couldn’t shut up.
March 22, 2020
My semi-feral cat
For fifteen years I had a great cat, the smartest and silliest and friendliest cat I’ve ever known. She developed kidney disease, and the vet wanted her “put to sleep,” but she still purred when I petted her, so euthanasia was out of the question. She died in my arms, purring and then quiet. Eternal catnip, Minky.
♦ ♦ ♦
After great mourning, I needed another cat in my life, but all the shelters are locked down because of the virus. A local shelter’s on-line description of one of their rescue cats caught my eye.
Isabelle, the website said, came from China, and she’s a legal immigrant, with a cat passport (who knew cats could get passports?). But the people who brought her over had mistreated her, and often left her outside, even in Wisconsin’s harsh winters, until they gave the cat to the shelter.
The website described Isabelle as “semi-feral,” but it’s a no-kill place, so she’d been there for years, with no interested adopters. When I inquired on the phone, they tried to warn me away, but I’m stubborn and had decided.
A staffer wearing rubber gloves and a full face-mask fought, struggled, wrestled the cat into the carrying case I’d brought, and all during the drive to my apartment, Isabelle hissed and growled.
When I brought the carrying case in, set it down, unlatched and opened the gateway, she darted out and under the bed. After that, there’s been evidence of a cat — food and water disappear — but actual sightings are rare, and there’s been no contact whatsoever. When we see each other, the cat either hisses or hides. “Semi-feral,” the shelter said, but I haven’t seen the “semi” part. She’s feral.
It’s been a week and she’s never attacked me, but always looks and sounds like she might. No regrets from me, though. I admire the cat’s reticence, and her sound judgment about me.
December 18, 2020
A matched set
The shelter had warned that it might take months for the cat to accept me, or she might never. And indeed, progress has been slight. Sometimes Isabelle forgets to hiss when I step into her room. I no longer worry that she’s going to attack me, but she’s clearly unhappy whenever I’m near her food or water (though all I ever do is replenish her supply; I’m not sneaking a bite or a drink, honest).
Oddly, she’s never objected when I empty her litter box. She watches, and finds it fascinating. Yeah, human, that’s what you’re good for.
Other cats have been ‘my’ cats, but Isabelle isn’t, and probably won’t be, ever. She’s absolutely her cat, and I have still never touched her. She won’t let me close enough, and doesn’t like it when I try, so I stay away.
We’re a matched set, I think. We both don’t like people in general, and me in particular. We’ve both been mistreated, and have trust issues, making friendships difficult.
She’s a four-legged fur-covered me, and our every interaction reminds me that maybe I should let down my defenses down once in a great while. I ought to stop hissing at strangers.
February 4, 2021
Some slight progress
Me and my feral cat might be making some slight progress. She’s always hidden whenever I enter the room, but twice in the last week she’s stood her ground and simply stared at me from twenty feet away — without even growling.
Maybe she’s noticed that my presence coincides with the arrival of cat food, or that I’ve never yet attacked? Or maybe she’s strategizing how to kill and eat me.
April 17, 2021
Détente, or the brink of war?
It was an odd night for me and Isabelle, my mostly feral cat. The closest we’ve been, until last night, was opposite sides of the room, with the cat glaring or hissing at me. Last night she approached twice, came within arm’s reach, but I wouldn’t dare.
She looked at me, almost the way a sane/tame housecat would look if she wanted attention. Or, like a killer tiger might look, stalking me, preparing to attack. So I only watched, and said some soothing words, same as I would if she was further away. She came no closer, but also didn’t run away, and then I must’ve fallen asleep.
When I woke up, and the cat was watching me again, from across the room. I put my hand down toward the floor, inviting her to approach for some petting or a treat or something. I’ve offered this invitation many times, and she’s never responded with anything but hissing, but this time she slowly stepped toward me.
So I withdrew my hand. Sorry, but that cat has hissed at me infinite times, and I honestly worried that she’d worked up her courage, and her intent was to rip the flesh off my hand.
Instead I stood up, and the cat hid as she always does when I move. In the kitchen, I fetched my mandoline glove, the knifeproof hand-protection I wear when slicing vegetables. If the cat attacks, I want her to attack the glove, not the hand.
Back in the bed, now wearing the glove, Isabelle watched from across the room as I lowered my hand to the floor and called her name. But she didn’t approach, she hid. Maybe I’d missed my moment. Maybe she was afraid of the glove.
This cat has been living with me for more than a year, and we’ve touched twice, both times very briefly, and both times she was trying to attack me, so any optimism must be cautious. My fingers are crossed, but if the cat’s nearby they’re going to be crossed inside that protective glove.
April 18, 2021
Snowfall
It’s been a year, a month, and a week since I brought this cat home. I’ve fed her about 750 cans of cat food and scooped her litter box 400 times, and she’s hissed when I entered the room, at first, and then whenever I was in “her half” of the room, and then whenever I came within ten feet or so. This has been our ‘progress’.
She’s been coming closer lately, and this morning the cat was staring at me from across the room, as she’s been doing for a week now. I mumbled a few words of quiet nonsense, hoping to convey the notion that while I’m twenty times her size, I’m not dangerous.
I slipped the protective glove onto my hand, and put my hand-in-glove down toward the floor, beckoning. She stared and stared and stared, and then she approached, same as she’d done last night. She came closer, close enough to touch, but I didn’t.
She was sniffing my chair, so I waited.. She sniffed at the chair and the nightstand, and then sniffed at the glove, and then, and then, and then, pushed her head into my gloved hand, so at last I touched her, through the glove. She yowled but didn’t run or hiss or attack, so I gently stroked her head.
If this cat would ever let me pet her, I always figured it would start slow, just a brief touch and then she’d retreat for a week. Boy, was I mistaken. She wouldn’t let me stop. I removed the glove, and petted that cat for an hour and a half. She never retreated and there were no breaks and honestly, my arm is a little tired from all the petting.
She loved it and so did I. I rubbed her head, knuckled her ears, stroked her back and her sides, gently tugged at her tail, and even briefly scratched at her belly.
Mostly, though, it was her head. Every cat has a favorite spot to be petted, and for this cat it’s her head. She loves it when I vigorously rub above her eyes and to the back of her head. She was loving all of it, but she loved that the best.
At one point, when I’d briefly stopped petting her to pick up something she’d knocked to the floor, she put her front paws up on the side of my bed-chair. It was just for a moment, and then I resumed petting her, and she went back to the floor, back to nuzzling up against me and the chair. But I’m taking that brief moment of paws-up as a hint that maybe one day she’ll be in my lap or my arms. Oh, man, that would be awesome.
Through it all, Izzy never stopped meowing, but ‘yowling’ is a more accurate word. She goes YOOOOWWL, and does it hoarsely. You’d barely recognize it as a meow, and I’ve always thought of it as a roar.
Until now the roar meant, Keep your distance, buster, but now it means something nicer, and I’m no longer scared. The yowl is growing on me. So’s the cat. There’s white fluff in the air, and a light dusting of white fluff on my bed-chair and on the floor, because Izzy is mostly white, with some orange and black scrambled in.
It looks like it’s snowing in my bedroom — white fluff everywhere — and a couple of times I’ve inhaled the fluff and spit it out, but I don’t mind. If this keeps up I’ll have to sweep the room once in a while, but I won’t mind that either.
And finally, when Izzy decided she’d had enough petting, she curled up at the side of my bed-chair, where I’d been petting her, and she went to sleep right beside me.
When I got up to type this, Izzy scampered back to her corner of the room, because she always (and still) freaks out when I’m standing up. But she didn’t hiss, she only ran. And I’m a happy old man with a happy cat.Yowl!
April 30, 2021
Still snowing
It is fabulous to have a cat again. I’ve sorta had Izzy for more than a year, but really only had her for a few weeks, since she suddenly decided I’m OK and allowed me to pet her. Now every time I pet my big fluffy happy cat, she yowls and yowls and yowls, and I marvel at how completely she changed without warning, from a hissing monster to the wondrous friend she is.
She’s the only living thing that I’ve touched in 2021, and it’s made life better, but (like everything else) it’s a mystery. I never changed my behavior, but suddenly she changed hers. Izzy does things Izzy’s way, and she wasn’t ready until she was ready.
Oh jeez, here she comes again — so excuse me, it’s time to pet the cat who’s now my cat.
4/30/2021
Republished 4/21/2024
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