The Cats Come Home

I waited a long time to have cats.

I was well into my 30s and had bought a house before I considered myself stable enough to have cats. I had seen friends back in college bring home a kitten and then wondered how they could go off and leave it so easily as their plans changed and they moved onward through life. I couldn't even bring myself to be that cavalier with my car!

So, finally, I was grown up enough to have cats! I watched the want-ads and finally saw an ad for free kittens. I went down one evening after work to pick them up and was told that I would be taking two females from the litter of six; I was given no choice in the matter at all. I had requested two, and definitely wanted two; I couldn't image keeping a cat alone, with no one else in the house being a native speaker of "cat".

So, I brought them home, one evening in November, the week after Thanksgiving in 1989. They were about 8 weeks old and looked like tiny little grey rats! I had pictured myself with a pair of white-and-tabby critters, but I ended up with a couple of little Russian Blue wannabes who grew up to be gorgeous creatures.

I had to run off to my night job so I shut the kittens up in the basement while I went off to earn my grocery money as a telemarketer; things were tight around here the first few years in the house. When I got home, I went down to the basement to play with these two little creatures who had suddenly come into my life. I was overwhelmed by the feeling of responsibility and wondered how much more onerous it must be for people who bring home human newborns.

Finally, I had to go to bed but I didn't feel good about leaving the kittens with the run of the house. I also didn't have the heart to leave them in the basement, so I brought them, their litterbox, their food and water up to my room and shut us all in to hopefully go to sleep.

Well, that didn't happen. The kittens bounced around the room for hours and I despaired of ever getting to sleep. At some point, though, I did drop off and when the alarm went off the next morning, I looked down at the foot of the bed where the two little kittens were sound asleep in a little heap. I reached over to pet them and they started to purr. At that moment, we bonded and I knew for certain that I had done something wonderful which would change my life.