Do You Come When You're Called? (Any and all of those people who do not understand pet rescuers may wish to skip this)!

Dot is our lovely grey/silver kitty.  She has golden ambered eyes.  She appeared on our patio one stormy, cold, wintry night.  Without hesitation Nyle and Ardis built her a shelter, put out water, and food.  So would anyone be surprised that Dot would leave...but then return when she was hungry or thirsty?

I tried to dissuade my rescuing familial members that we already HAD THREE rescued critters, and one more would put us twice over the condo limit of only two pets.  I urged them not to bring her into the house.  Of course, she came into the house.  I pleaded to have them leave her outside most of the time.  She was in the house for longer and longer periods of time.

She hated both of our other cats.  Katty was old at thirteen years.  She weighed all of 3 pounds.  Spike was a great deal like his name.  He was the prickly and unchallenged head of the animal pack in our family.  Nyle was the unchallenged head of the human pack in our family!  Then there was Rolly our dear 10 ish year old Poochan, which is a poodle blended with a bichon.  She fell madly, head over heels in love with Rolly.  We think that she views him as a strange type of cat.  They are around the same size.  Unfortunately for her, the affection is NOT reciprocal.

My family allowed me the privilege of naming Dot.  (I'm certain that they thought that if I named her I would connect to her).  Not so much.  I named her Dot because she has a tiny dot of white fur under her chin.  It took a couple of years before she relaxed enough to roll on her back.  I discovered then that she actually has a bikini top and bottom on her stomach consisting of white fur.  It's a good thing that I didn't discover those patches until after I named her.  I totally would have named her Bikini, and what kind of name is that for a kitty?  lol

I moved into my first all alone apartment after Nyle died.  Dot came with me.  Spike had also passed.  So I now only had three critters, Katty, Rolly, and Dot.  All ferocious twenty pounds of Dot still stalked Katty.  I still kept Dot at an emotional distance.

Eventually we had to mercifully release our eighteen year old Katty Kaliko when she developed cancer of the bladder.  I think for awhile afterwards she would appear randomly around Dot.  Dot would look up, shoot straight in the air fur standing tall, and then dash to a different room.  This continued for several months.  I felt like Katty was at last getting revenge on Dot.


Today I let Dot outside while I did some snow shoveling.  That turned out to be a big mistake!  There is a place in our front yard that is VERY steep.  It's dangerous for me to walk in that part of the yard with my balance issues, and my difficulty in always making my legs do what I need them to do.  To complicate everything there is a rose bush bare with vicious thorns waiting on the attack.

She seems to revel in the fact that it's almost impossible for me to reach her in this hideaway.  I called her, and called her, and called her (hey, it works sometimes).  Next I went into the house and closed the door.  (I hoped that she would come running to be let inside).  NOPE!

Finally, with all hope gone of obtaining her in any other way, I literally risked life and limb to carry her back into the house.  It made me think about the times in my life that opportunity called, but I ignored the call.  I believe that this is true of all of we humans on this planet together.  Sometimes it literally is easier to stay in the same old unfulfilling rut than it is to answer a call for change, or improvement, or both.  What is calling for you today?

Remember that in our lives we have the ability to choose priorities and then act accordingly.  We CAN listen for and HEED the call, and find satisfaction and growth. 

By the way, Dot has become very dear to my heart.  After I turn the light out at night she comes and stands on my tummy and uses her front paws (which are clawless...who removes a cat's claws and then abandons them)? to massage my neck and face.  It is an extremely soothing segue into sleep.  I'm grateful now for her adoption into our family (At the same time PLEASE do NOT bring us any kitties or doggies...we really DO have our limit)!