One Strange Cat

Eight years ago when my daughter was about to turn 13, I offered ear piercing as a birthday gift. For some crazy reason she turned that down and said she wanted a cat. We already had 2 cats. Sammy was clearly MY cat just as Jake was My Sweetie's cat. It was perfectly obvious that Kate would not be a good cat owner. For some reason we caved and my Mom told us about a little pet store in Arlington that had a few poor kitties in cages. I called and the idiot teen that answered the phone could not answer a single question without putting me on hold for each and every question and the questions were: 1) How many cats do you have? 2) How many are female? and 3) What colors are the females? We had to get a female because the our two were male. He finally got back on the phone and said they had two females: one white and one speckled. He was clearly not a cat person. I don't particularly like white cats, but we drove over there anyway. Well the "white" cat was the beautiful cat in the picture which we believe is a Seal Point Ragdoll - http://rfwclub.org/seal.htm - so we fell in love and brought her home. Kate named her Lilly. We set up everything for her in Kate's room for the adjustment time before introducing her to the other cats. So a typical day went like this: Me walking into the living room to see Kate lying on the sofa reading a book. Me: "Kate why aren't you in your room keeping Lilly company." Kate: "I don't know. This is more comfortable." So I spent hours at a time in Kate's room playing with the new kitty and teaching her to use the scratch post. By the time we made the introductions amongst the cats, Lilly was MY cat. My Mom believes she was a breeder "throwaway." Her little blue eyes constantly dart back and forth, side to side, almost like a weird vibration. The Vet said she was probably brain damaged, and she's always been very shy.

My husband and I are very casual. We eat dinner every night sitting on the floor at the coffee table. Under the coffee table is an 8' x 5' area rug. Generally the cats stay on the carpet, just off the area rug, in what I call the "bunny sit" which is all paws tucked underneath. On occasion when one of them ventures too close, we rattle a newspaper at them and yell "Not on the rug!" About a week ago, I was engrossed in whatever we were watching on TV when I noticed that Lilly's nose was practically on the coffee table, just to my right. For some reason, instead of grabbing a newspaper, I said (in a very loud voice), "Hey! Rug rule!" She walked to just off the area rug and "bunny sat" on the carpet. My husband and I just looked at each other in stunned silence. She's done it two more times since then and it is not any less weird. How is it that our odd little brain-damaged cat understands "Rug rule?"

I've read lots of blogs and usually at this point people say something like "If you're not a cat person, sorry for boring you." Yeah, I'm not like that. If you don't like cats, I just feel sorry for you. Cats are cool. Lolo took a picture of me with a cat in the courtyard/cemetery behind St. Louis Cathedral in New Orleans. I've thought about that very friendly cat a lot in the past week. I hope he's okay.