I’ve adopted all sorts of cats. My son once brought home a gray tabby from a gas station parking lot, promising his girlfriend would adopt the cat. She didn’t. Our spicy bobtail black and white kitty survived a “hoard,” while another was saved from a kill shelter. After a neighbor’s pleading phone call, her cul-de-sac cat moved in with us, and when my mother agreed to an assisted living arrangement, I inherited her cat. I’ve also fostered two feral kittens whose mother repeatedly deposited them in our truck’s engine compartment. In the end, I found a home for those kittens, my own, thus ending my cat fostering career.
Adult cats come with baggage. You never know what they have been through or how they have been treated. You find out pretty quickly that trust is an earned thing. Raising my kittens was different. Here were two completely dependent creatures that needed round the clock feeding. Too small to leave unattended, I put them in a large pet crate with food, water and a hot water bottle to snuggle on. After vet trips, medications, regular feedings, and playtime, they began to grow and thrive.
They are now adult cats, and yet, I still see them as those tiny kittens that placed their trust in me. They are secure and happy, believing they will be lovingly cared for everyday. If I scold one of them for scratching my chair, she fearlessly runs to me ready to have a conversation. Their trust in me is humbling, even sacred. Accepting their trust means accepting the responsibility of preserving that trust. After all, our trust is something that belongs to us, even if we are cats.
~Lisa Kiel
The reponsibility of that trust. So important, this does require thinking through and then following through. Remembering today the times I failed that trust and learned. We humans have much to learn.
Well stated. Trust is very high on the list of important attributes . Love your feline love story