A Noble Cat Indeed
Elizabeth was looped into the cat world by a prominent neighbor who is a member of a high end cat rescue network. She agreed to foster a terribly frightened little black-and-white kitten for adoption for a few weeks while in Miami Beach. Little 'Archie' was the light of her life in the coronavirus gloom.
Liz loved Archie so much as she socialized him that remembering him brings her to tears now. "Love is a selfish thing," I said. She disagreed and did the right thing to adopt him out since she has to return to Washington, where her family has a number of dogs she loves and tends to, including dogs that could make mincemeat out of a cat.
She gave Archie up to a perfect home, a virtual cat paradise, where his name is now Rossi and he loves to play with his foster brother, Martini. This bittersweet success was followed by a phone call: Archie's sister needed fostering. Would she please take her in for a couple of weeks?
No, don't do it, I wagged my finger at Liz while she was on the phone. She had her heart broken enough already, and I feared they would make a kindly cat madonna out of her. Why, she might even wind up looking like a cat before they got done with her, roaming the alleys to feed strays and save abandoned kittens. I only wish they had found me and taken me in when I was a street urchin.
Of course under pressure she just had to say 'yes' to another cat because she has a heart of gold, and they knew it, despite her stern Germanic demeanor. Of course the cat was a problem cat so-called, upon which she was expected to work a miracle as she had done with Archie.
First of all, this kitten was female, and then black, and black cats tend not to be adopted despite the fact that they can bring good luck and match every possible decor.
I visited Liz to see the kitten that proves black is beautiful. The kitten certainly is not vain about it, as she does not like to be seen by strangers in broad daylight. She has a regal bearing, looking larger than she really is, which is another barrier to adoption because people like cute little kitty cats.
"Her name should be Sheba," I suggested to Liz. "The Queen of Sheba came up from Sheba, now called Yemen, with a train of camels bearing gifts for Solomon. He fell in love with her, and she stole the Ark of the Covenant."
"I saw a documentary about the search for the ark," she said. "There are archaeological treasures in that sad country. The ark may be hidden somewhere else, maybe in Africa, in Ethiopia, perhaps, where there are many black Jews. My Washington family is Greek, so I am naming the cat Athena."
"Well, nobody knows the name of the Queen of Sheba," said I. "No doubt some Greeks will claim she was as Greek as Cleopatra, who was born in Egypt. The Africans think she was as black and beautiful as ebony."
I still preferred the name 'Sheba' for the kitten, especially since she loves Sheba cat food, practically licking the bowl clean, turning her nose up at pate, the mashed up stuff. The Sheba brand has a gray Egyptian cat as its model.
Still, 'Athena' fits, for she goes on the warpath at night, running wild about the big living room that she would not be caught dead in during the daytime, leaping and jumping, waging war here and there, and once even defeating the white orchids on the table, strewing their bodies all over the place. Especially prized as booty are shoes: shoestrings give her leverage to drag them under Liz's bed.
On the other hand, Athena, after her campaigns, is very romantic. She scrambles onto the bed to try and get Liz to play, jumps up and down there, and puts herself under Liz's hand to get petted although she hates to be otherwise handled. Liz just cannot say 'no' so she gets up to play with her.
"My job is to socialize her for adoption, and I must change her schedule so she is up during the day," said Liz, "She trusts me and is exceedingly loving. I gave her her first bath, and I was surprised that she did not struggle much."
"A cat is a cat is a cat, cats are nocturnal animals by nature, and animals should not be forced into anything but given incentives. It seems to me that Athena is training you, and not vice versa, although you have made progress socializing her."
Now that brings us to another issue, that cats have definite personalities, and Athena is stubborn. She gets up on the window casing to watch the sunrise after Liz plays with her, then retires to her cozy 'loft', a drawer in the bathroom cabinet, for the entire day, and gets mad if she is disturbed. She is, in effect, a South Beach cat, a queen of the night at that.
Another characteristic of note: Athena, like many girls, is talkative. She has a remarkably broad vocabulary, from sweet begging for attention at night, to screams when put in the carrier. No, she does not like to be picked up, period, and worst of all was the ride in the car to get her vaccinated and fixed, with her screaming to high hell for Freedom all the way to Coral Gables.
Liz's neighbor brought two kitties down to her apartment to display to a little girl for potential adoption the other day. The gentleman and his daughter happened to be black.
"She all black, she all black, Daddy!" The child gleefully observed when she saw Athena there. But she had to choose one of the little kittens.
Now, with two weeks to go until Liz has to go back North, we very much hope that black cats are indeed lucky, because Athena needs some luck. If she is not adopted, the cat people will take her back to a shelter, where she will be terrified and all the love Liz gave her lost for good, and she may wind up put down or abandoned somewhere to be feral if she can survive somehow at her young age.
Cross fingers. This noble black cat will become the best friend of the person who loves her as she is, for why should she be human? She's a perfectly beautiful black cat.
War of The White Orchids
Athena was triumphant this morning! She attacked the White Orchids on the dining room table in the middle of the night and left their bodies strewn all over the battlefield! Fortunately some were revived and put back into their vase, but they have a defeated look.
Athena, Greek goddess of wisdom and war, participated
with Hera and Aphrodite in a beauty contest judged by
the handsome albeit cowardly Trojan, Paris. Because Paris did not
choose her as winner, she sided with the Greeks in the Trojan War.
But when Greek
warriors desecrated her temple
, she immediately turned against them.
Note. Athena was adopted on June Twenty One by a professional woman who said she knows black cats are lucky. She will be renamed Billie Holiday or Ella Fitzgerald.
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My wife thought her Lhasa Apso, Toby (Tobias McCracken McMuffin), was lonely, and we had a mouse infestation in our new neighborhood. So, she found a half grown gray and black striped kitten that immediately begin dispatching mice to her delight, even playing with them in front of her, like the dogs had played with the little black one. Anyway before long, she was peeing at the front door wanting to get out at night and was soon discovered to be pregnant. I told my wife, and she agreed, to get rid of the problem at a shelter. For a couple of years after my wife left me (not over pets) the carpet by the front door still stunk to high heaven!
Ron