Home at The Animal Planet

Zoe is a cat. That doesn't make her unusual at our house. Three of them are here. But Zoe was the first.

Zoe is a beautiful animal - a black and white cat - and she usually doesn't have much of a naughty streak. But she does have an independent spirit. When she was a kitten she took some delight in running into our room before we noticed she was there. She'd streak under the bed and not come out until she was good and ready, thank you. Now she's grown, and can't sneak under the bed as easily. We thought she was broken of the habit UNTIL -

Until the day she decided to make her sneak-and-dash attack on the front door. Someone made the mistake of holding the front door open just a second too long, and  - ZOOM! POOF! She's gone.

Oh, the long faces of Meri and Logan!

We found Zoe later. She was on the roof of the garage across the street. I have no clue how she got there; she's been declawed. She was looking over the edge of the roof: "I don't remember it being this high when I climbed UP here and sure as God made little green apples I'm NOT jumping down!"  Time for me to come to the rescue. We found a chair for me to stand on. I could barely touch the roof, and Zoe wanted none of my rescue offer. Every time she saw my hand come over the edge, she'd peer down at me, and retreat to the peak of the roof. No chance I could grab her there.

Someone thought of a clever stratagem. Let's get her food bowl and bait her with it! That increased her curiosity, but only slightly. She still wasn't ready to trust me enough to get her down.

We finally did get her down. It involved getting the chair out of there. We didn't have a ladder - we're probably lucky we didn't - but my daughter has a pickup truck and a hard cover to the bed of her truck. I stood on the cover and could reach over the edge of the roof. With that, and more baiting with food, and Zoe either tiring of the game or realizing no other form of rescue was coming, Zoe finally decided to let me get her down.

Five minutes later Zoe was asleep on the back of the couch, like nothing at all had ever happened. About two weeks later the scratch marks on my arm were hardly visible. Grunt.

The second of the cats is Smoky. Smoky is jet black, so a black cat crosses my path daily. We didn't buy Smoky at a pet store. It was a January day, rainy-snowy mix, about 35 degrees or so. Midwesterners get the picture quickly. My son-in-law was standing outside the back door when this kitten came to him. This kitten was obviously very young, soaked, cold, and very hungry. He didn't have the heart to leave her like that, so it was off to the vet, and Smoky joined the family.

Smoky is a friendly, well-behaved (no door dashes for her) cat. She demands little. She does like a little petting in the morning - a greeting is always nice. (Zoe may be petted only by her permission. She'll let you know.) She gets along well with the other animals, with any person. I know cats' memories aren't long enough for her to remember what life was like before we welcomed her, but she shows no inclination at all to bite the hand that feeds her. Makes her different from lots of people, doesn't it?

The third cat is Nalla (I promise you, I didn't assign these names). Nalla's a brown cat with golden eyes. She thinks she's a lion and, if you look at her face in just the right way, you can see the family resemblance. Nalla is the most playful of the cats. She doesn't understand why all the critters around her don't flee in terror - "See? Lion here!" as she stretches her paws. Sorry, Nalla! all we see is kitty. We think you're lyin'.

Nalla also came into our home as a stray. It was a late summer-early fall day in the schoolyard where two of the grandkids go to school. Nalla came up to my daughter - very young, very small, very thin, very obviously hungry and castoff. So - PREACHY MOMENT WARNING - if you have a dog or cat and can't handle the puppies or kittens, get your dog or cat fixed. K? Smoky and Nalla would both have had really bad ends. They didn't, but we can't be there for all of the castoffs.

Thanks for hanging out for a few with me!