I like pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals.
- Winston Churchill
You can visualize a hundred cats. Beyond that, you can’t. Two hundred, five hundred, it all looks the same.
- Jack Wright (the Guinness Book record holder for the owner of the most cats at one time- 689)
When we first toured our new house as a prospective buyer, I saw a beautiful, fluffy cat peering disapprovingly through through the glass into the TV room from the back porch. I assumed it belonged to the owners and left it at that. Lots of homes have cats, right? This one would be leaving with its owners and that would be that.
Imagine my surprise when I awoke on our first morning in our new place and went down to the kitchen to find the same cat on the back porch…along with four of its friends? Turns out the previous owners had been feeding the neighborhood cat(s)…so guess who picked up that tradition? It appears I’m well on my way to becoming the neighborhood’s crazy cat lady. I went out and bought two 15-lb. bags of cheap dry food, and I’ve begun incorporating feeding the starving horde into my morning routine. I’m not sure if they have their own homes in the neighborhood or if they’re feral, but they look healthy enough. It’s hard to be certain, because only one of them will let me get anywhere near them. They scatter to the four winds when I open the door and walk out onto the deck to fill the food bowl. I may be feeding them, but their level of trust in me is still hovering around zero.
Surprisingly, Fred- who’s strictly an indoor cat- has been curious and surprisingly accepting- no howling or hissing or any of the other normal cat “back the f—- off” behaviors. The reality that there are four, sometimes five, cats on the opposite side of the back door glass seems to faze him not at all. I think he’s just curious and perhaps wants to check them out, though he’s a threat only to himself and very likely would be flayed limb from limb by the street-savvy gaggle on the back porch.
Erin’s not thrilled about our new hangers-on, but I’m the one taking the responsibility for feeding them. I hope they’re healthy and that they’ll allow me to get close enough to check them out. I’m also hoping that they actually have homes in the neighborhood; the last thing we need is a litter of kittens in our back yard.
