Cat

Miracle Molly

August 27, 2018 by Nancy 12 Comments

Someday you’ll read on Facebook or in this blog spot that we had to say good-bye to our cat, Molly, but not today!

In April we lost our cat Beau to cancer. I still wake up in the morning missing him. In May, Molly was diagnosed with kidney disease. (Note to self: Don’t have two cats the same age.) We noticed she wasn’t eating and was losing weight. The blood test the vet ran revealed that she was in serious need of immediate fluid injections and recommended an emergency vet for overnight IV treatment. You don’t want to know what that cost.

For the next couple of weeks we alternated infusions in the vet’s office and at home (and no, we aren’t medically trained!) with blood tests to see how she was responding. This meant additional expenses and many trips in the dreaded cat carrier for Molly.

She did respond to treatment and started eating again. Still, after a weekend of praying and crying (me) about what to do for her, we decided that we didn’t believe in extending her life beyond its natural conclusion, especially since we’re not signing up for extreme measures when our time comes. If that was it for her, we would just love her and let her go when it was time. A hard decision, but one that gave us and her peace.

We informed the vet that Molly would now be in palliative care. We would watch her to make sure she wasn’t experiencing any discomfort, and hope to bring her in for her final trip to the vet before she suffered any dire consequences from the disease.

For about a week we watched her closely. She sat and stared at us with a “cat stink eye” as if to say, “Why’s everyone staring at me all the time?” Given that we thought she only had a few days left, we relaxed the cat “house rules” for her. I let her wander out with me when I watered the pots on the downstairs patio, and you’d think she’d gone through the wardrobe into Narnia so thrilled was she to be sniffing around in forbidden territory. We also left the bedroom door open all night so she could come and go at will, because after all, the poor dear didn’t have long to be with us.

That was three months ago and Molly will celebrate her 15th birthday this week! In style, I might add, because it didn’t take long for her to not only appreciate her new privileges, but to actually expect and demand them! How dare I try to sneak out to water pots without her. She protests loudly from the other side of the glass door if not allowed to accompany me. And not only is she in our bedroom all night, she jumps on the bed in the early morning light, meowing and poking at me until I get up to feed her the soft kidney-care food she’s come to love. We are enjoying her in spite of her newfound diva status, however, and she’s reveling in our extra attention.

Who knows why we have all been given this sweet time together? I prayed, “Lord, please heal her or take her.” I didn’t want to have to make another one of those painful last trips to the vet so soon after taking Beau. It may be a miraculous answer to prayer that she’s still here.

And we don’t know if this will make any feline medical journals, but we’re pretty sure some cats have at least 10 lives. We’re enjoying Molly’s 10th, and we’re glad we don’t have to say good-bye just yet.

Happy Birthday, Miracle Molly!

Molly, the “Quiet Time” Cat

February 28, 2013 by Nancy 22 Comments

Our cat, Molly, has what the local humane society calls the “personal assistant” purr-sonality. This means that whatever you are doing, Molly will be nearby just in case you need some help. Wrapping packages? She’ll gladly chew on the curling ribbon for you. Working on taxes? She’ll happily sprawl out over the paperwork on your desk or push ballpoint pens and paper clips onto the floor to keep you entertained. Just whatever she can do to help.

Unlike her boisterous brother Beau (also a cat), she doesn’t burst into a room demanding attention. Rather, she usually curls up just outside the door—an eavesdropper with whiskers. Whenever we have a group of people over, she’s likely to claim a spot under the coffee table as if she were an invited guest. She rarely gets close enough to anyone to be petted. She just wants to listen in on the conversation and stay nearby to help with any hospitality requirements.

Given all that, you won’t be surprised to hear that for years she has consistently joined me early in the morning during my quiet time. As I sit and read, work on a Bible study, or turn to the Lord in prayer, she just sits on the hassock in front of me purring softly. She’s rarely in the chair with me or on my lap, just right in front of me where she can be ready to help if needed, and where I can give her an occasional pat on the head or a rub behind the ears.

What is surprising is that recently she has come to expect that this shared time with me will happen on schedule—and to be quite demanding if it doesn’t! The coffee is set to perk at 6:30 AM, so if she hears it perking, and sees the sunrise, she knows I need to be in my chair in the living room. If I’m not moving in that direction, she now meows persistently outside the door of our bedroom to get my attention. After I roll out of bed, find my robe and slippers, and open the door, she takes off down the hall to keep our appointment with the Almighty.

Now wouldn’t you think that knowing the Lord of the Universe was willing to spend some time with me would be enough to get me out of bed? Shouldn’t it be enough that He who hung the stars and gives life to everything that has life may have something important to tell me? The answer to both questions is yes. Yet it helps to have a feline alarm clock.

And I don’t mind sharing my quiet time with Molly. After all, Psalm 150:6 says, Let everything that has breath praise the Lord. In this season of my life God is using this sweet little grayish cat to bolster my spiritual discipline. Her faithfulness keeps me faithful, and I’m ever so grateful.

Where’s the Bear?

September 16, 2012 by Nancy 8 Comments

It seems that everyone on my street has seen the neighborhood bear except me. “Didn’t you see him yesterday between those two houses?” the neighbors asked. Or, “I just saw him in the bushes in your back yard,” someone else said. So I look and I look, but I don’t see him.

By now I am feeling like my granddaughter Sophia, who when she was about four years old and squeezed between her two older sisters in the back seat of my car, was dismayed that she didn’t get to see a dead skunk in the road. I didn’t know why she started crying just after I announced, “Phew! There’s a dead skunk in the road!” but when I asked her she said, “I didn’t get to see the dead skunk. Everybody gets to see the dead skunk in the road except me.” My husband and I often repeat her statement whenever we have any kind of disappointment that leaves us feeling left out.

But I didn’t want to be disappointed this time. I was determined to see the bear. I heard from one neighbor that the bear began his rounds just before dawn, so I programmed my coffeemaker to brew a pot of coffee at 5:00 AM last Sunday morning. Up by 5:30 AM, I turned a chair toward the window in my living room. I sipped coffee and I waited. Surely he would appear to munch on the wild plums by our driveway. We had seen the scat that proved he enjoyed those quite a bit! So I stared at those bushes, but I saw nothing.

My cat Molly settled in to watch with me although she didn’t know what we were watching for. Filling the morning quiet with her gentle purr, she seemed clearly pleased that I had gotten up so early just to sit with her. Or so she thought.

I’m guessing that if you’ve read this far you are ready to hear, “At last, there he was—the bear!” But nope. No bear. Yet sitting silently as the sun cast a pink light on the mountains, I realized there was so much more to observe. Molly and I heard a couple of squirrels chattering quietly to one another about their plans for the day. We saw a hummingbird silhouetted at the feeder, his feathers all ruffled up with morning dew.

Although I hadn’t opened my Bible yet, I knew it was replete with verses to speak into our morning watch. This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it (Psalm 118:24) I whispered to Molly. I didn’t see the bear, but I did see wonderful reminders of the glory in each new day—and of how we should honor God by watching vigilantly as He unfolds it.

I’m glad I didn’t miss that early morning watch, but I’d still love to see the neighborhood bear before he goes into hibernation, his belly full of our wild plums. If you happen to see him, please tell me. Oh, and if you see a dead skunk in the road, please tell Sophia.

Garage Sale Mania

September 3, 2012 by Nancy 19 Comments

Labor Day has come and gone but garage sale signs are still popping up like dandelions in most neighborhoods. With each one I see, I get that familiar itch to go check out the sale—but then I stop and tell myself, “I already have a garage.” If my own bad joke doesn’t dissuade me, then I may drive by slowly, but I rarely ever stop.

And after the last garage sale I held, I doubt if I’ll ever have another one. It had been ten years since my last one. I suppose my memory of the pain had been erased, leaving just the tantalizing pleasure. For whatever reason, I gave in to temptation. I had a garage sale.

I knew it was going to be a one-woman show when my husband and I agreed he should go ahead and go on a weekend men’s retreat, but that’s not when I decided the garage sale was a bad idea.

The sale was on a Saturday, so on Friday evening I was in our garage surrounded by all the priceless items I had collected. Where to begin? Soon I was setting up “store” and having fun merchandising the treasures into departments. By this time it was about 11:00 p.m. and I hadn’t even begun to price the items. But that’s not when I decided the garage sale was a bad idea.

The curtains in the garage caught my eye and I reasoned they should be washed if my store was going to impress a bunch of strangers, so I took them down and put them in the washer. Re-hanging the curtains about 1:30 a.m., I fell inside the big silver garbage can I was standing on. But that’s not when I decided the garage sale was a bad idea.

By 2:30 a.m. I was making real progress getting the color-coordinated stickers on all the items. The garage door was down and the door to the house was open, so my two cats came out to see what I was doing up so late.

Suddenly I heard a scuffle in the corner of the garage. I looked up to see my big black and white cat, Al, with a mouse in his mouth—its little tail and legs sticking out. I convinced Al to drop the mouse, who promptly scurried away, and got both cats shut up in the house. Then I realized I still had another hour’s work to do in the garage—only now I’d be doing it with a mouse who was hurt, angry, or both. That’s when I decided the garage sale was a bad idea.

After three hours of sleep, I was up at the crack of dawn to greet the shoppers. They literally ran up my driveway and into the garage as soon as I opened for business. Many of the early birds left after canvassing the garage briefly. Those were the shoppers expecting to find the Hope diamond carelessly displayed alongside the old bedroom slippers.

By day’s end I was practically giving away anything someone even glanced at sideways, still I had a garage full of valuable stuff. It was another week before a charity picked up the remainder of my treasures and we had our garage back. Of course it could have been worse. At least none of the shoppers lifted the lid to a pot only to discover a dead mouse inside!

I applaud your frugality if you shop garage sales, and if you have the fortitude to have them, I wish you the best. As for me, I’m going to avoid the mania…unless one of those signs really entices me of course!