When Rudene and I lived in town, we didn’t have much time to take care of a pet or a place to keep one. We don’t like to keep one in the house.
When we retired, we built a house out in the county and had plenty of outside area to have any kind of animal we would like to have. One day I noticed a beautiful cat, a dark shiny gray in color. I thought that someone had probably abandoned him and he was wild and would not come to me. I left food out for him, and in a couple of weeks he would let me pet him.
After a couple of years, a friend helped me and we fenced about 6 acres of wooded area and added a couple of goats and two miniature donkeys. This attracted coyotes, and our cat disappeared. I believe that he was caught by the coyotes. I sure hated to lose the little fellow.
A few weeks later a friend I had worked with at the sheriff’s office gave me a little kitten. He was a pretty little rascal, a solid black coat on him. I kept him in the basement at night until he was old enough to stay on the screened in porch. He was a friendly cat and liked to be petted. He would meet people on the front porch and expected a little petting from all that would take the time to give him a rub.
One winter day as all our family was coming in for Sunday dinner, Glenda, our daughter-in-law, reached out to give our cat his wanted rub. A streak of static electricity about one-half inch long sparked from Glenda’s finger to the cat’s nose. Glenda screamed and jumped backward and the cat jumped from the porch and ran around to the back of the house. That gave us a laugh of the day.
I was letting the cat stay in the basement at night, and in the morning, he would always come up to the door at the top of the steps. For a couple of days, he was very slow getting up the steps. I thought there was something bad wrong with him so I took him to the vet. After checking him over, the vet asked me if the cat was really important to me. I said that I thought a good bit of him. The vet then said that she could run all the tests and know what was wrong and what to do for him, but it would cost $100. I told her to run the tests. The next day I picked up the cat and she told me that he was not making red blood or losing red blood. I paid for him and took him home. The next day he died and I buried him next to the bird bath that he always drank from- then I told him good-bye.
Copyright 2020 Humble Roots, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
